Single Portal for Development and Harmonisation of Draft Legal Acts (TAP portal)

Objective of the project:

The objective of the creation of a Single Portal for Development and Harmonisation of Draft Legal Acts (hereinafter – the TAP portal) is to modernise the process of decision-making at the Cabinet of Ministers, by providing more accessible public participation and a more efficient and rapid process for developing and harmonisation of draft legal acts, as well as the improved conduct of sittings  (development and approval of draft agendas, drafting and signing of the minutes, preparation of resolutions, management of documents adopted at the sitting of the Cabinet of Ministers), incl. improvement of the functionality of the information system for organizing and conduct of sittings of the Cabinet of Ministers and Cabinet Committee, the State Secretaries’ meetings (hereinafter – the e-portfolio). Generally accessible and restricted access information will be available on the TAP portal.

Principal actions towards the objective:

• Ensuring project management.
• Drawing up the project description for inclusion in the target architecture of information and communication technology.
• Development of cost-benefit analysis.
• Development of software procurement documentation and execution of the procurement procedure.
• Development of a single portal for the drafting and harmonisation of draft legal acts.
• Introduction of the Single Portal for Drafting and Harmonisation of Draft Legal Acts.
• Changes in the regulatory framework required for the use of the Single Portal for Drafting and Harmonisation of Draft Legal Acts.
• Development and introduction of the e-service “Public Consultations on Draft Legal Acts”.
• Improvement of operational processes and usability.
• Improving the quality of data and ensuring the re-use of data by preparing data sets to be re-used.
• Information and publicity measures on the implementation of the project.
• Deployment of the Single Portal for Drafting and Harmonisation of Draft Legal Acts to the data centre.

Project status:

• On 15 May 2018, the technical specification of the Single Portal for Development and Harmonisation of Draft Legal Acts was developed.
• The negotiations on the selecting the TAP portal developer have been completed, and on 3 December 2018, the State Chancellery and LLC Tieto Latvia entered into an agreement “On the Creation of the Portal for Development and Harmonisation of Draft Legal Acts, Maintenance and Provision of a Guarantee”.    
• Development of the TAP portal launched.
• Representatives from all ministries are involved in the development of the Portal for Development and Harmonisation of Draft Legal Acts.
• Transfer and adoption of Release 1 and 2 of TAP portal, which include the process of drafting and harmonisation of draft legal acts and control of implementation of draft legal acts’ development tasks.
• The TAP portal team of the State Chancellery and representatives from nine ministries took part in the acceptance test of Release 1 and 2 of the TAP portal from 10 June 2020 to 26 June 2020. A total of 23 remote meetings with 260 experts were held.
• Based on a scenario-oriented approach, tests were carried out for the TAP portal on the following topics:
  1. Development of control tasks, harmonisation with the Ministry and the subordinate authority.
  2. Development of Ministry’s initiative related tasks.
  3. Input of the legal act’s content: laws and amendments thereto, CoM regulations and amendments, development planning documents, international treaties, informative reports, orders.
  4. Annotation and shared annotation of a legal act.
  5. Harmonisation of a legal act, opinions.
  6. Processing of a legal act.
  7. Administration of the TAP portal.
• The TAP portal team of the State Chancellery and representatives from 11 ministries took part in the acceptance test of Release 3 and 4 of the TAP portal from 11 November 2020 to 7 December 2020. A total of 15 remote meetings have been held and 502 experts have participated in these meetings.
• Based on a scenario-oriented approach, tests were carried out for the TAP portal on the following topics:
  1. Harmonisation of draft legal acts.
  2. Administration of the TAP portal: creating workflows, user groups, reporters.
  3. Progress of the informative report.
  4. Progress of the draft legal act and consideration at the State Secretaries’ meeting.
  5. Progress of the draft legal act and consideration at the sitting of the Cabinet of Ministers.

"It was very pleasing to receive recognition from the representatives of ministries for the innovative idea on the TAP portal and the choice of a successful solution! It looks functionally great. We are pleased with the team's achievements, because the public administration should already have such a solution long ago.”

The creation of the TAP portal will be a new approach to drafting and circulation of draft legal acts, by conceptually abandoning the document as a tool for organizing the processes and information in the public administration. The TAP portal will not be a record keeping system but rather a data circulation information system.

The information will be created, stored, processed and distributed digitally (digital by default), all data will be stored in a structured manner in the TAP portal and subsequently centrally transferred from the TAP portal for storage in the State Archives. All information on the life cycle of a draft legal act, from the work order on the development of a draft legal act, inter-institutional harmonisation, control, involvement of the public in public consultations, until the decision is taken at the Cabinet of Ministers, the transfer of data to the Saeima for further decision-making or for publishing in the “Latvijas Vēstnesis” will be available in a single place - in the TAP portal, rather than in fragmented and different systems or sites.

As part of the project, the TAP portal will be developed, including the following modules: TAP register, TAP development tool, TAP promulgation and harmonisation, TAP submission and consideration by the Cabinet of Ministers, follow-up of tasks. The TAP portal will include the working environment and public section, including e-service “Public Consultations on Draft Legal Acts”.

The working environment of draft legal acts will include simplified functionalities for the development, harmonisation, approval and control of draft legal acts.  The templates for the development of draft legal acts, assistance tools will be offered by synchronising the information input in different information environments (draft legal act, annotation, statement, opinion). The TAP portal will also provide the opportunity to accumulate and analyse structured data from the initial impact reports (annotations) of legal acts.

By upgrading the e-portfolio, the process of organising the sittings of the Cabinet of Ministers and decision-making of the Cabinet of Ministers will be improved, incl. the members of the Cabinet of Ministers and other participants of the meetings will be provided with the opportunity to familiarise themselves conveniently and on the same site with the history of preparing the matters to be considered at the sitting, to record the individual vote, if any, and to add individual opinions on the matter under consideration.

In the public section, every user will be able to find generally accessible and TAP-related information (draft, attachments, opinions, statement, etc.), with the exception of restricted access information.

In addition, the user will have the opportunity to track the progress of a draft legal act from development and public consultations to the publishing in the “Latvijas Vēstnesis” (agreed, approved, signed, etc.). Links to other viewpoints of the TAP portal, such as the agenda of the sitting, will be created in the TAP portal. It will also provide an opportunity for everyone to apply for updates on the draft legal acts’ register.

Outcome indicators:

• TAP portal -  a solution for shared use by the public administration institutions has been introduced.
• Public e-service “Public Consultations on Draft Legal Acts” has been introduced. In order to ensure that public opinion is clarified prior to the development of the draft legal act, the opportunity for public participation will be provided on a single site, in the public section of the TAP portal using e-service “Public Consultations on Draft Legal Acts”.
• Four operational processes have been improved (development and harmonisation of draft legal acts, control over the implementation of draft legal acts’ development tasks, process of approval of draft legal acts and chairing of meetings (including e-portfolio), public consultations on draft legal acts).

The overall implementation of the project will contribute to achieving the following performance indicators (the value to be achieved within three years after the end of the project):

•  “A single environment for the development, harmonisation, approval and control of draft legal acts, including 115 public administration institutions and 50 non-governmental organisations (incl. organisations of social and cooperation partners of the government).
• The proportion of technical (non-automated) operations in the process of developing and harmonisation of draft legal acts will decrease from 100% to 33%.
• Three content data sets available for reuse and shared use (generally accessible information – a draft legal act and its annotation), classifier of legal acts, classification of policy areas).
• An increase in the use of the public electronic service “Public Consultations on Draft Legal Acts” to 85% of all opinions submitted. 

Project number: No. 2.2.1.1/17/I/014
Total project costs: EUR 1 680 000 (incl. ERDF funding: EUR 1 428 000; state budget funding: EUR 252 000). 
Implementation: 8 January 2018 – 7 July 2021

Other useful information:

Information on the specific support objective 2.2.1 “Ensure Increased Re-use of Public Data and Effective Interaction between the Public Administration and the Private Sector” of the operational programme “Growth and Employment” and detailed description of the project are available on the website of the Ministry of Environmental Protection and Regional Development.