The Open Government Partnership is a multilateral initiative that aims to secure concrete commitments from governments to promote transparency, empower citizens, fight corruption, and harness new technologies to strengthen governance.

Australia’s first Open Government National Action Plan was developed in collaboration with the community and launched in December 2016. It contains commitments to strengthen and improve transparency and accountability in business, open data and digital transformation, access to government information, integrity in the public sector, and public participation and engagement.

Over the past few months, we’ve undertaken a process to develop our second Open Government National Action Plan 2018-20. In this first phase of consultations (19 February-30 March), we sought your views about prospective themes and commitments for the Plan. Now, in this second and final phase of consultations from 25 June-8 July, we’ve released a draft Plan for comment. To participate online, please click one of the links below (if you have not already, you will need to first register for an account to make comments):

• National Action Plan Introduction
• Strengthen the national anti-corruption framework
• Enhance the transparency of political donations and funding
• Improve the sharing, use and reuse of public sector data
• Improve public service practices using place-centred approaches
• Enhance State and Territory Participation in the Open Government Partnership
• Enhance public engagement skills in the public service
• Engage Australians in the Independent Review of the Australian Public Service
• Expand open contracting and due diligence in procurement

You can also attend a face-to-face consultation:

• Canberra: 1-4pm, Wednesday 27 June.
• Melbourne: 3-6pm, Friday 29 June

Following these final consultations, our Open Government Forum will meet again in July to consider all feedback received and make final recommendations to Government on the content of Australia’s second Open Government National Action Plan 2018-20.

If you value transparency, accountability and public engagement – we encourage you to get involved!