Minister's Gov 2.0 invitation-take our data, and multiply

General applause for the new Australian Government data.gov.au website launched by this blog post from Special Minister of State Gary Gray, with the invitation "to explore, access and reuse the data available on the site." Stephen Collins in commenting says" Hooray! Not before time." 

The Department of Finance and Deregulation incoming government brief that the Minister had in September last year, in bringing him up to speed on the Declaration of Open Government, listed under "Action required in 2010" the suggestion that Mr Gray endorse the Declaration's principles "possibly via an opening post on the AGIMO blog." Better late than ever. But Minister Gray's post six months after assuming responsibility for the function hardly positions open government as an important whole of government priority with the needed leadership from the top. The Gov 2.0 Task Force report for good reason recommended that endorsement come in the first place from the Prime Minister, only to see the retiring Minister for Finance release the Declaration the day before the election was called last year. The cause of open government will need more, constant and stronger nurturing. 

Meanwhile with more than 200 datasets available and an invitation to suggest others, hackers are in from the cold. Any local into something like What We Pay For?