Britain's new e-envoy is brushing aside scathing criticism of the government's e-commerce plans and promises Whitehall is on track to meet its 2005 target.
In an exclusive interview with Guardian Online this week, Andrew Pinder insisted all government services would be online within the next four years, meeting a deadline set by the prime minister, Tony Blair, last year.
His assurances come despite a report from internet analyst Forrester Research, published on Friday, which cast doubt on Whitehall's ability to deliver the ambitious promises of e-government.
Pinder has been working in a caretaker role for the past three months, after the resignation of the first e-envoy, Alex Allan.
He says permanent appointment to the role will allow him to focus on longer-term planning.
"Some of the time I've been very conscious that someone else could be coming in to take over," he said. "I've not been wanting to steal the limelight or take decisions which they should be taking."
There had been suggestions that Pinder was reluctant to take on the role permanently; his name had not cropped up on many observers' shortlists because of his insistence that he would only take the job for the interim period.
Now he is finally able to look more than a few months ahead there are plenty of hard decisions which need to be taken, according to Forrester Research.
In its paper, eGovernment fails the grade, it states bluntly that "the UK government's aggressive e-commerce plans won't come to fruition." It says only the intervention of the private sector will allow the government to reach its goal of 100% electronic delivery of government services to businesses and consumers.
Worse, it grades the efforts of a sample of departments from A to E, awarding an average of D. Departments hit with an E grade include the Department of Social Security, Office of National Statistics and Customs and Excise.
Even the online efforts of the Office of the E-envoy got a lowly D rating, beaten by the the likes of the Inland Revenue (IR) and Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS), which both scored the top mark awarded - a C.
"Plans for delivering services are wrong-headed," writes Forrester analyst Caroline Sceats.
"Only the IR and DCMS show any understanding of the pressures the government will face as a portal in the competitive internet environment. The result: opportunities for building on strengths go to waste."
The Forrester report's comments have been dismissed in some quarters as being under-researched, naive and focused on the comments of a handful of IT suppliers who would stand to benefit most from the failure of the e-government initiative and subsequent out-sourcing of work.
Pinder, although clearly unhappy about Forrester's conclusions, prefers to be more diplomatic. He points to what he claims is the progress the drive is having, and the results already achieved.
He is quick to reject the suggestion that the "Sir Humphreys" of Whitehall are intent on stalling the e-government initiative.
"I think that is rubbish," he says. "The civil service is not resistant to change. There are issues with the civil service, as with any large organisation.
"One is that this is a large supertanker which takes a long time to turn, and it takes a while for people to take on board this new method of communicating. This is just as hard for people here as it is for those in the private sector.
"Take banks, for example; I don't think banks are doing any better in e-commerce than the UK public sector.
"The second issue is that the public sector is enormously diverse, with lots of sections, and trying to get people to be creative about what they do online is a big challenge - probably a bigger challenge than anyone in the private sector is having to face."
Despite these problems, and the criticism, Pinder is confident that government will meet its 2005 deadline.
"We've had the first round of e-strategies, published on departments' websites," he says. "Those strategies show that most departments are well on track to hitting the 2005 target. If people took the trouble to read that they would see it.
"The big issue for me is that we don't just want them to hit the 2005 target; we want them to do it in some style. We want them to deliver these services, not just by putting these things online, but we want them to really target these services and be much more creative, using this new medium in a different sort of way."
And, despite Forrester's misgivings, that kind of talk appears to be what industry wants to hear. There, reaction to Pinder's appointment has been positive.
Jim Norton, head of e-business at the Institute of Directors, says he is "delighted" by Pinder's appointment. "I wanted someone who had both public and private sector experience and Andrew's got both of those.
"To my mind he has acquitted himself well in a difficult time - it's not an easy period when you're acting as interim. I wish him good luck in what is a very challenging job."
Meanwhile, Tim Conway, director of industry affairs at the Computing Services and Software Association, was also happy with Pinder's appointment.
"We particularly welcome the fact that he's been in the job three months now," Conway says. "He understands what the job is about and can get on with the very important tasks which his job entails.
"His profile - having worked in the civil service and some large organisations outside the civil service - means he is well suited to taking on the change management role."
