Archive for 'politics'
Declining trust in politicians
The Committee on Standards in Public Life has published its latest survey of public attitudes towards public servants; and if anything, there's a slightly more negative tone to this set of results, compared to previous surveys in 2004 and 2006. For those of us who see engagement as a key area, there are some interesting [...] read on »
Political engagement with June Sarpong
I never 'got' June Sarpong MBE as a TV presenter - she always seemed (at least) half-asleep to me. Her elevation to the status of Question Time panellist wasn't met with universal acclaim. But to her immense credit, she does seem genuinely passionate about bringing young people, specifically young women, into politics - as the [...] read on »
Big test for single-issue politics
Like everyone else, I'm trying to make sense of David Davis's decision to resign his Commons seat, and fight a by-election to win it back. He says he's trying to start a national debate on 'one of the most fundamental issues of our day.' But when it comes to the vote, assuming he wins, he'll [...] read on »
Puffbox's onepolitics site relaunched
A few months back, I built and launched onepolitics: an automated website which pulled together the latest blog postings from the 'proper' political commentators. It wasn't ever meant to be a mass-audience website: I built it for myself, but if anyone else wanted to use it, they were welcome. As I wrote at the time: [...] read on »
On the political parties' sites…
Looking at the political parties' websites, I've found a few surprising features - and not necessarily pleasant surprises. SNP and DUP people, I'm looking at you here. read on »
PoliticsHome: overwhelming and soulless
'Staying on top of modern politics has become a full time job,' declares the long-awaited PoliticsHome on its About page. 'Things move too fast: it is too much for any single person to track.' Unfortunately, the same can be said about the site itself: load up the homepage, and a torrent of headlines hits you [...] read on »
Labourspace: great idea, awful execution
Relaunched* (presumably?) at the weekend's Spring Conference, LabourSpace.com is the Labour Party's campaign-based social network. Ed Miliband's welcome message calls it 'the place where those of us who share Labour's values come to discuss how we want to make Britain a better place to live.' There's much to like about it, but they get some [...] read on »
Cameron's online challenge
David Cameron takes his 'be my friend' campaign to the Guardian's Comment Is Free this morning, with a piece about the internet 'transforming our political culture', and how young people are more political than ever - just not via the old-style channel of political parties. As I noted last week, he's presenting this new concept [...] read on »
New report on politics and internet
Provocative stuff from Mick Fealty over at the Telegraph's Brassneck blog. He highlights a report by the Centre for Policy Studies which suggests that 'the internet could offer MPs an unmatched opportunity to create a niche for themselves, and to re-empower local politics.' And echoing the Economist's point about government in competition, he notes: The [...] read on »