According to Socitm, the standard of local government web sites is improving, but only one can be classified as being “excellent”.

This is the finding of a Socitm study, called the Better Connected Review, which looked at all 468 web sites run by local governments. A team of reviewers visited each one, rating it according to a structured questionnaire comprising 93 questions. Sites were assessed according to their content, usability, transactional facilities and accessibility.

A spokeswoman for Socitm said that councils could use the report to identify what is best practice among their peers, and learn how to improve their own sites. "We are trying to encourage local authorities to provide the best service that they can. Every year sites get better, but every year the bar is raised."

In order to achieve an excellent rating – the highest available – sites should be easy to navigate and search, should be current, have useful links – internal or external – and let people carry out transactions.

But just one web site, operated by Barking and Dagenham, achieved an " excellent" rating. Overall, Socitm said that many sites had made big improvements since the study was carried out last year, but added that many problems still exist.

The usability of sites was hampered by a reliance on third-party technology as facilitator, according to Socitm, while accessibility was also found to be lacking. Damningly, the report said that the poor performance in this area highlighted a discrepancy between the sites' claims and reality.

Other sites lost points because of the overuse of registration forms. Councils use them to gather personal information before granting access to services, but Socitm said that they are open to exploitation.

Martin Greenwood, programme manager at Socitm, said "This year we sharpened [our] focus. Overall, the report shows that usability remains a key challenge; only one out of 121 transactional sites meets all five of our criteria for excellent usability, whereas 21 do for excellent content."