In an opinion adopted on July 8, the Economic, Social and Environmental Council formulates several recommendations to meet the "challenge of digital transition for public services".

It thus recommends making the digital a "public service" in its own right. "The "digital public service" must meet the principles of continuity, mutability, equality and neutrality. The digital public service must be fully integrated into the political and philosophical framework of the Republic and its founding values of freedom, equality and fraternity, which place men and women at the heart of society.

Progressiveness and non-exclusivity will be based on :

• the introduction of a "right of refusal" of digital technology, allowing a person who does not wish to use digital technology or dematerialization not to be obliged to do so, for example in tax or social matters;
• the guarantee of maintaining non-digital access rights (solutions?) over time (by mail, by telephone and/or by physical reception)
• the establishment of legal exceptions to the obligations of dematerialized payment without additional costs by guaranteeing, for all dematerialized procedures, the existence of another payment modality than those linked to a bank account,
• the principle of sending paper notifications of allocation, withdrawal or revision of rights, unless the user expressly agrees to electronic exchanges.

The EESC recommends making digital technology a national priority by

• the creation of a large Ministry of the Digital Economy in charge of embodying, supporting and steering a transversal economic, social and environmental digital policy - the creation of an Agency of the Digital Economy and Artificial Intelligence, associating the National Council of the Digital Economy, and regrouping the Agency of the Digital Economy, the Interministerial Delegation of the Digital Economy (DINUM) and the ANSII...
• clarification of the place, role and coordination of the independent authorities responsible for ensuring compliance with the ethical principles that must guide the generalization of digital practices, namely the CNIL, the CSA and the ARCEP.
• accelerating the deployment of HSBB everywhere and for everyone by prioritizing fiber-to-the-home and fiber-to-the-business solutions (FTTH and FTTO) in order to provide all territories with equal access to very high-speed Internet and mobile telephony.

The EESC calls for the definition of "non-digitizable" public service actions (in particular in hospitals, maternity wards, EHPAD, justice services, etc.) and for reinforcing their access through a physical presence at the right "time-distance" of the users.

To this end, the EESC calls for an impact study to be carried out on all major operations to transform public services. In particular, the ecological contribution of digital technology must be assessed on a solid basis:

• transportation needs of users or public service employees;
• increased or decreased energy or material requirements of equipment;
• impacts or clutter in the city or in the rural landscape of relays or facilities, and ultimately a balance on greenhouse gas emissions.

The EESC recommends making digital inclusion a priority of the "digital public service" by :

• strengthening digital training (initial, continuing and lifelong)
• Facilitating public and private funding of publicly controlled inclusion schemes at the regional level,
• Supporting the commitment of associations to inclusion, particularly through third places and the commitment of young people in civic service.
• encouraging the development of places dedicated to the digital acculturation of companies in connection with consular networks.

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