Philip Young has an interesting and lengthy post at
Behind The Spin: Blogs and the 2005 election.
Before I comment I have to give a disclaimer that I am also a politician who blogs.
Tom Watson MP was the first politician in the UK to start a blog and my blog as a local councillor started very shortly afterwards.
While Philip's analysis of blogs as part of an election campaign I
think it misses the point about why the few politicians who are
blogging actually blog.
Certainly I started mine as a way of keeping my constituents informed
about my activities and what is happening locally, as well as creating
a dialogue for them to respond and provide comments. The ward that I
represent is one of the most deprived in Leeds, indeed the country, so
is not an obvious contender for high levels of internet access.
My councillor
blog
gets about 120-160 unique visitors a day. How many of them are local it
is impossible to say. However, I do know that a number of influential
local people read it. From the logs I can see that many local voluntary
and public sector organisations visit it regularly. I can also see that
there are a number of visitors who use the free internet access in
local libraries. I know from speaking to people that are active in
local community groups that they read the blog. These people in turn
then help to spread some of the information by old-fashioned word of
mouth - the most communications channel that exists.
That is how politicians can really use blogs to help them. Blogs also
fit in with modern political campaigns which is about talking and
listening to the electorate all year round and not just at election
time.
That's not to say that you can't use blogs and traditional websites
effectively for campaigning as well. At the moment I'm having a highly
publicised tussle with a member of the controlling group on Leeds City
Council who is responsible for axing a bonfire and fireworks party in
my ward. You can take a look at the microsite I created at
www.stopthecuts.co.uk and you can read some of the media coverage in the
Yorkshire Evening Post.
The blog provided local people with a means to respond and has received
almost 20 comments. About 80% of them are in favour of our campaign,
but to show that the blog really welcomes debate the negative comments
remain as well.
Another excellent example of a politician who understands the potential of blog is
Councillor Andrew Brown in Lewisham.
If you're interested in the future potential for political blogs in the UK then subscribe to the
feed as I've got a couple of interesting projects in the pipeline at the moment.
