In this guest post, NSW MLC Penny Sharpe discusses the use of the Web by politicians. Penny has been a Labor Member of the Legislative Council (NSW upper house) since October 2005.
Last year, I had an intern do an audit of the use of technology by MPs in the NSW parliament. Conducted in mid-2008, the findings were less than inspiring. Only 39 of the 136 members of the NSW Parliament had personal websites. Only 12 of the 39 websites had recently updated information; 18 others had media releases as their only current information; three were a few months old and out of date and five were a few years out of date. Only seven members of the Parliament were using Web 2.0 tools, such as blogs, polls and online petitions.
In May 2007 I launched my own website with a viral video. Two years ago my aims for the website and online presence were to be informative, transparent, action-focused, provide a two-way dialogue and be willing to try new things (and possibly fail).
In the first month online I had 215 unique visitors, 383 visits and 911 page views. This has steadily grown to 890 unique visitors, 1044 visits and 1651 page views per month.
The website is built around my e-newsletter Red Leather. Red Leather has had 57 editions and is sent to over 2000 people every fortnight. It reaches many more.
In the past two years I have become quite addicted to social networking through Facebook (379 friends) and Twitter (118 followers). I have a basic presence on YouTube, bebo and MySpace. This is a new way to engage with people and has provided another way for them to raise issues and seek my assistance – and increasingly they do.
For the record, my contributions to Twitter and Facebook are exclusively written by me (mostly on my desktop and laptop but also from my Blackberry). My technologically literate and talented staffer assists me with drafting my blogs and keeping the website up to date – although I select all the content. I write my own e-newsletter.
What’s worked: The site has provided an example of how MPs can work online at a time when only a minority have engaged in the potential of Web 2.0. The site has also provided:
- a one-stop shop for government announcements
- regular updates about what I have been working on and the issues I’m pursuing within and outside government
- a place for community campaigns to get a wider audience for their causes and events
- an opportunity for two-way interaction with me and my work.
What hasn’t worked: The blog began life unmoderated but a combination of spam and offensive posts saw it quickly become moderated. The number of comments has been very small. I suspect this is because:
- the traffic on my site is too low to sustain a day-by-day discussion
- the amount of time I’m able to spend on detailed blogs has reduced as I’ve taken on more roles in government
- the time I’m able to spend in the blogosphere and participating in the debates does not allow me to build a wider audience who are interacting in this medium
- the issues I am working on are not always able to be aired publicly
- Facebook and Twitter are easier than blogging
- the discipline of being a government member requires not posting the controversial material that would bring more traffic to the site
- maybe it’s too boring?
What plans have fallen by the wayside: I had planned to run occasional online forums but found them very time-intensive to get up and running for the numbers of people who would participate. This is something I may revisit.
I had also hoped to have a section on evidenced-based policy. Just sharing the link on Facebook and Twitter and through Red Leather does this far more quickly and immediately.
What I’d like to do more of: Participate in the blogosphere, blog on issues broader than government announcements, build an online community interested in human services delivery across government that could input into government decision-making, get over my aversion to seeing myself on camera and get into pod and vod casting.
What’s happening with other MPs: I am about to update the 2008 audit and note that, post-Obama, there has been growth in the use of personal websites, Facebook and Twitter. The NSW Premier Nathan Rees has started twittering and the Lib/Nats seems to have spent some time and resources getting online. Some of my Labor colleagues are now on Facebook.
I’d like to develop 10 do’s and don’ts for MPs online. So what do you want from MPs on the Web? Who do you know who is doing it well (if at all)? What is it that they do that works for you? Why do so many do it so badly?
I get my state MP Clover Moore’s email newsletter every week which I find great for keeping in touch both with what she’s doing and cultural/political events in Sydney. I’m surprised to discover that she doesn’t have a Facebook profile.
I know that my fed MP Malcolm Turnbull does have a Facebook profile and also has an e-newsletter … I don’t get either of these but maybe I should, just to see what he’s up to on the local level.
We once had what appeared to be a genuine visit from Joe Hockey here – the people with admin access to the blog would perhaps know if the ISP/email were legit 0 and I’d say that was textbook how-not-to-interact online. He was squabbling with commenters who were criticising his performance on q&a if I remember rightly. It’s just such a bad look to drop in and start trading insults. It goes without saying that it must be hard to sit in silence and read the kind of things people say about you online, but if you want to engage you need to do it using the same standards as you’d use with any other people you’d just met, in any other on the record situation.
While I’ve got lots of info from political blogs and tweets about what is going on, it’s all a bit too much “control the message” stuff for democracophiles like myself.
Politicians would be really brave if they allowed the public service to do the same. Put everything that is going on up online and talk about it. Obama is starting down this road with http://www.whitehouse.gov/open/innovations/ and http://www.data.com
Otherwise, its good healthy campaigning – electronic kissing of babies – but at this stage, politicians are not using the web to ensure their constituents are well informed about government process and actions, nor are they allowing open and transparent debate between the people who do a lot of the policy design work – the public servants – and the broader community.
Interesting comment presidentdalby but as another pollie (Penny just can’t get away from me) I wonder if we should be looking at the use of the web as an infomation ‘giving’ exercise…from my perspective applications like facebook are about an interactive experience, seeing what people are talking about, sharing a few thoughts and perhaps letting people find out a little bit more about us that the stereotypes that party politcs turns us all into….in short the web allows a true “communication” to take place that the print media does not.
Penny, congratulations on the amount of effort that you put in to communicating with your constituents. Thanks to the often “fine” reporting by journalists we the public only get to hear negative stories about our politicians – the internet in general is a great way for pollies to communicate directly with the public thereby showing us that you do more than we read about in the Daily Telegraph.
Now if only other politicians took up the mantle
Thanks Penny for the post
Have a look at the http://www.cmfweb.org/index.php Congressional Management Foundation and their Golden Mouse Awards. (2007 http://nposoapbox.s3.amazonaws.com/cmfweb/2007_GoldMouseReport.pdf – I haven’t looked at this one. One of their earlier award document was an exceptional document in determining and evaluating a good website. I’ll see if I can’t find it, past copies don’t seem to be available as a web link.
I used to hand out copies of it to my public service clients when asked what content they should have available on their websites and I didn’t want to say “how the f would I know, I’m a nerdy software engineer who can make web pages talk to databases but web pages talking to your target audience eeech I got nothing, hey, who is or are your target audience?”. I instead said ohh that’s tricky to say but this is very good and whilst they looked at the title I would make good my escape
We’re still in business, so it can’t been too bad a tactic (although the boss keeps me away from them most of the time – especially after this department head wanted a more vibrant green on his website so I adjusted the settings on his monitor until it was just “perfect”, I still don’t understand the problem there, the client was happy as punch)
I reckon the least any MP should be doing these days is an e-newsletter and up-to-date website.
“Ruling Class Out Of Touch With Modern World”
News at 6:30.
Thanks for the comments: Obama is setting the pace – the key to his work post election is the opening up of the public service to people. What perhaps is more important is his willingness, so far, to move beyond command and control of the message. It is the willingness to allow others into the decision making processes of government (a seat at the table that he had during the transition to government comes to mind)that will be watched closely my all of us interested in having input from our communities more than every 4 years at election time.
Thanks Trev for joining in. For those who want to see a different approach have a look at Trevor’s website http://www.trevorkhan.com.au and then his facebook page.
Dave – keep handing out the material – I used it when I was designing my website. I am surprised the number of times I have discussions with people about the value of websites and they think they are too time intensive, too hard to maintain and not worth it for the number of visitors. I don’t believe that Web 2.0 is the be all and end all but it is an essential part of my work and my commitment to communicate with as many people as possible in relation to the decisions the NSW government is taking every day. The numbers speak for themselves in terms of who I am able to reach.
Penny please don’t encourage the clowns we have here in QLD, see below:
http://www.youtube.com/user/macalindenfilm
A little more on Obama’s administration re web set from Radio National’s Future Tense
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/futuretense/stories/2009/2554372.htm
This is slowly changing, but unfortunately still too common with public.
But to get back onto topic, your particular site Penny, I have very few ideas unfortunately, but do appreciate the pollies and public services that do strive to inform/serve. I remember one particular US politician’s site that got a Golden Mouse Special mention some years ago, the content was grouped and organised by target audience – ie one grouping was ‘are you a student or teacher’ and within was reference material on the electorate, it’s history, including political and current issues today. I have no idea how well it worked though. Although the Golden Mouse award said at least it made a explicit effort to identify target audience, their needs and then content to address that.
Thanks again Penny for caring enough to take the time to keep us informed or at least having a go at it!!
It’s good to hear pollies getting online. The internet needs to be seen less as a toy for kids and porno, and more as the most effective democratising agent the human race has ever seen.
It’s not surprising to hear that forum conversation hasn’t gotten up and running, as this does take a critical mass of not only readers, but contributors and commentators that people enjoy reading. Have you considered letting your staffers play in forums? Obviously personal opinions would have to be carefully guarded, but they could act as though provokers and intelligent questioners. Also, perhaps special events like “live online with your member” (I’ll let that one sit for a second… I would suggest not using that title, ever); a regular event that people know beforehand that you will be there to take questions, criticisms, and perhaps even praise. It could be an effective method of “sensing the zeitgeist”, as it were. Perhaps having these happen on a set date after each newsletter (maybe check for when it is most common to have people coming to your page now).
Penny, do you think one reason why digital interaction with politicians hasn’t been as successful (seemingly) in Australia compared to the US, relates to their more decentralized style of governance?
Even if, through your interactions with constituents online, you were to decide that your views on an issue diverged from the party line, you’re fairly limited in the ways you can express that publicly, let alone act on it publicly because party discipline is so rigid here.
In the US, online activists have so many options – direct money to candidates who vote in particular ways, set up ballot initiatives in some states, support primary challengers; none of this is open to Australian activists;, individual politicians can’t take advantage of it either.
The collective effect is to take a lot of the sting out of online engagement, because everything gets decided in the cabinet room (and if you’ll excuse the cynicism here) after consulting a) big business, and b) focus groups drawn from marginal seats. So what’s the point?
Great article Dave. The challenge that is set by this stream of discussion is for an Australian government website to receive the following compliment: “I’ve never seen a government website this useful”.
Robert – I partly agree with you. There are constraints on me that I have being part of the government. That does not mean however that the ideas and suggestions that people give me about issues do not get a chance to go into the mix of the internal debate and decision making that happens as part of the political process.
Across government there are so many issues running at any one time – there are also many opportunities for individuals and communities to have input – the real challenge is to make that meaningful – to me that means – giving as much information as possible, genuinely taking that on board (preferably with the means to have open discussion) and when the decision is finally made, reporting back to those who have given input as to how the final outcome has been decided.
This is where I believe that Web 2.0 provides the cheap, accessible tools that can be an additional vehicle for participation and consultation. The immediate challenge is to encourage (and perhaps mandate) the use of these tools as part of any community consultation.
I also don’t agree that US pollies are participating more meaningfully online. Some are – many are not. As part of my audit last year my intern found that all US Senators have sites but most had not added anything post election except media releases and pleas for money. Post Obama – everyone is finally taking notice.
So Obama leads in matters of democracy on-line!? So someone like DavidIcke.com and AlexJones of PrisonPlanet.com, and InfoWars are just bad boys if they show up Obama again and again!? If Democracy and how to participate in it are the following, voting, submissions and witnesses in enquiries for committees, and now feedback via the computer, that, and opinion direct and personal and via mainstream media, the citizenry had better watch out that, computer use on-line is purely numerical camouflage for appearing to do things with enabling legislation.
Petitions, on-line or elsewhere are capable of influence,and finally ignoring the invitations to participate, for reasons of “lets see some performance first.”
Computer use has for some time, made the functioning matters of democracy far worse,as can be regularly seen by expenditure and wrong or misinformed computer system upgrades…which are still costing this country heaps. I personally,have felt terrified by the expenditure on computer systems on the rail systems of N.S.W. over a long time. The stupidity, the totally outrageous lack of excuse,would be met with a bullet, in other countries and the citizenry looking on uncaringly. If computers are to be a legitimate part of our democracy, they should be seen as a not always reliable tool for human expression..and have been very costly to individual Australians, as much as to this nation. Enthusiasm for the tool should be tempered by the fact, it can be the bluntest of instruments where finer work needs to proceed.
The great selling point for greater use of the web by pollies is efficiency.
Contrary to popular belief, our politicians do work hard, and if they can respond to issues on the web quickly – or get a sense of community feeling via blogs – more time can be spent thinking deep policy thoughts and governing the country.
Blogs can also be good for getting a sense of the “base” (horrible Americanism) – especially how much your base is willing to put up with!
Thanks for dropping by, Penny. The NSW Government has its share of problems, but Penny Sharpe is always out and about and working hard. Unfortunately there are lots of NSW Labor Parliamentarians like Penny Sharpe quietly doing their jobs – but they never get much media attention.
…that last sentence wasn’t very artfully put, but you know what I mean.
I’m not surprised at the findings of Penny’s audit. Unfortunately the Australian experience has been that our pollies tend to engege as little as possible with the punters, except when it comes to campaign time.
There are many potential reasons for this. Perhaps they’re too busy with the business of Parliament, committees or their portfolios (should they have one). Perhaps they couldn’t be bothered.
Little wonder that the punters regard pollies of all stripes as out-of-touch, at best.
This opinion would no doubt be improved if said pollies would engage a bit more with the people they represent. And I don’t mean websites full of glossy Party propaganda or appearances on the morning show.
I mean discussing policy and taking people’s views on it; Explaining why, for example, this policy position is preferable to that one (whether it be a policy concerning coal-fired power stations, prison reform or egg marketing).
The web is ideal for this.
It’ll be a whole lot of work. And sure, there is the risk of insults, abuse and the like, no doubt.
But in my view people will be a whole lot more inclined to support a pollie if they realise that he or she is not just some seat-warming hack, but someone who will listen and respond to their concerns (however ill informed) on the issues of the day. And if those concerns are indeed ill-informed, perhaps the pollie could take the time to explain to the poor sod why. That way both he or she and the punter get something from the exchange.
Maybe I’m just dreamin’.
The problem with Evan’s input is that the human being who has a public title of MP. etc. may not for a variety of reasons,all human,and nothing to do with the role, have an incapacity to actually work through the various options of actions by legislation in proffered opinion , that may all be well presented,but evolve around circumstances that are unknowables. That is, like the Climate Change Debate.Even with much participation even detailed sets of responses,rather than briefs, from a politician, the end result maybe, that the sitting member is likeable,and that is the only thing that is agreed upon in the sitting members electorate,whereas the issue of interest passionately held.. .maybe outside the electorate as legal entity etc.So coal mine extraction,coal fired power stations etc. certainly only as some type of consumer of electricity is the only direct interest.If someone is bubbling on about reducing Greenhouse gases Nationally, are they genuine if the price or bill for electricity goes up,and is outside the legislated workables of a sitting member!? It is just too simple to think the problem of Web participation resolves these problems,whereas, they maybe much simpler technically and financially,but, the sitting members Party Unity prefers a talented PR approach as obsfucation.
Penny,
I think that part of the reason why the US pollies tend to have a more active presence online is that their participation in the democratic processes is more visible. Unlike the system here that sees crossing the floor as a major career limiting move it is something that individual congressmen and senators do as a matter of course over there – so online and other activity to correspond with constituents can actually strongly influence the likely voting pattern of the individual member.
Here it acts as a possible conduit into the party room, which then either accepts the decision of the Leader or takes a very brave step of rolling him or her.
While individual constituents have a chance to be heard through these processes, there is much less likelihood that their views will actually affect the way you, or any other member, actually votes on the floor of the house.
Thanks Penny for the guest post.
Penny doesn’t mention it, but there must be something to the fact that 5 of her 12 up-to-date websites are from the 4 Greens and Gordon Moyes – all upper house crossbenchers.
Penny: I think part of the limiting problem you face is that you’re not even allowed to publicly take a stand different from the Cabinet any more – even to the extent of saying “I’ll take up X cause within my party room” – if it’s remotely controversial. Peter Garrett, to his credit, tried this tack early on but the media and political culture forced him back into the box. Thus while you may well take up a constituency’s cause, you can’t really tell them unless you win.
The spin culture also does not allow for a serious discussion about the nuances of policy decisions by politicians. So again, you’re so constrained about what you can say – unlike crossbenchers and independents. That’s one of the reaons why they sound more real, honest and in touch to the punters. I don’t know what you can do about that!
Thanks for your input and thanks to Susan for asking me to contribute. Final comments:
For Philip, Andrew and “Josh”: If you want to have a debate about collective decision making, caucus solidarity, why crossing the floor is a no no in the Labor Party and why I don’t think it is necessary for the mainstream media and individual voters to know every time I disagree with the Premier or the cabinet then that’s a blog for another day.
What I would say is that government decision making is a far more complex process than described by the mainstream media, our most world weary mainstream commentators and cynical online stirrers. It’s definitely not perfect and nor can it ever be when the decisions that governments make have to balance a range of competing interests and competing priorities. Put simply – you can’t please all of the people all of the time.
Government’s can however do much much better. There is a great desire for people to have input into the decisions that they care about. I also believe that there is a need for governments to be open to embracing a good idea that could come from outside mainstream policy advice. There are good examples around the world that show how Web 2.0 is empowering individuals to have a say and put up their good ideas – if governments and public sector organisations provide the tools. This is something that I will continue to work on into the future.
Penny,
I was not trying to say that this process is wrong – as you note this is a seperate debate, although I do have a strong opinion on it. I was just trying to illustrate why web presences from individual members bound by the Pledge are bound to be less useful than those that are not. I would not, as you have done, single out the ALP on this, however – even if the Pledge did originate there.