Politicians vs Media

The report of the the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee relating to the actions of the PCC with regards to coverage of Prince William's relationship with Kate Middleton and the News of the World's royal vociemail tapping incident continues to build on the theme increasingly put forward by this country's political class.

While stating that there is nothing better than self regulation and that a free press is a cornerstone of democracy the message is becoming ever stronger that standards in the media are simply not good enough and that self-regulations has to be seen to be effective to be credible etc.

In other words we are in a period of very thinly veiled threats to the media to improve its behaviour. After all, falling standards means a less well informed public and would be a threat to democracy.

All this talk, of course, goes back a long way. It is just the latest manifestation of the inherent tension between politics and media. Politicians themselves are to blame for declining standrads of debate beacuse they want to be on TV and TV isn't the place for debate, it's the place for entertainment. They are also the ones who want to avoid discussion and focuse on personalities because this helps them to avoid tackling issues. Politics is not about policy or principal anymore, it's about getting elected.

Meanwhile the media, which is also in business to entertain and make money, and not to inform or educate plays along with the show, focussing on the trivial and cutting resources focsussed on policies and issues.

So why now all this fuss from the politicians? Why was one of Tony Blair's final parting shots aimed at suggesting that something had to be done to help improve the nature of policial discourse in this country? I suppose concerns over the legitamcy of Parliament and the nature of the UK state are reaching a critical point. Perhaps both sides have realised they have pushed things too far. Gordon Brown's first inititiaves seem very much to have been aimed at re-engaging the electorate.

But, I don't see how any of this is going to work. If you regulate the media, it will become dull and no one will watch or listen. How can you regulate content if you are operating ina dregulate dfree market economy. Unfortunately the commercial pressures on media created by the structure in which they operate and the need of politicians to have a high profile means that I can't really see a way for the quality of debate to improve.

What we need is for people to genuinely become interested in politics and policies and that is simply not going to happen when there are no fundamental ideological differences to debate and when life is simply too fast to sit down and think about what you actually might belief or want.

Drama

A dramatic weekend across the country came to dramatic end for us and we spent the evening watching a block of the University of Westminster’s Harrow Campus burn. I haven’t had a chance to go and see what the damage is but judging by the height of the flames and the umber of fire engines that turned up, it’s not going to be pretty. It was quite a surreal experience really.

The weekend itself was spent visiting friends down in Crawley. There’s not much to do there so other than eat and drink, when we did go out we headed for Brighton Saturday and then Lewes on Sunday. It was all very relaxing and I managed to put on a load of weight. Football on Wednesday will hopefully put that right.

Anyway, moving on. After a day at work this evening I have actually made a start on writing my dissertation. Working largely from memory I set out a few of the arguments surrounding turnout in UK elections, whether it is a sign of a democracy in crisis or not and the role communications strategies may have played in affecting voter confidence and turnout in elections. I’ve also written a bit about whether it is political communications strategies or the ‘feral media’, to quote a former Prime Minister who are to blame.

Essentially I have just set up the question of what – if any – impact new media might have on political communication and whether it can play a part in creating a more participative democracy. I still have a lot of work to do on it firstly because the arguments are quite complex and I need to made clear that communications is not the only, or even the most important, issue at stake here. I also need to trawl through all the books I read earlier in the year to firm up the arguments I have put forward. Essentially I have to write a 2,500 word essay on whether British democracy is in crisis and the reasons behind it.

And finally, hopefully some more questionnaires will show up soon from Hackney. I’m not going to try and contact any more people now as time has run out but I will continue to chase those who are still pending.

Jimmy Leach

NMA (www.nma.co.uk) readers have voted Jimmy Leach, the Head of Digital Communications at 10 Downing Street, as the person who has made the greatest individual contribution to new media over the past year.

Today's front page story highlights the fact that he set up the ePetitions strategy which has “enabled a generation to feel engaged in politics and has given each citizen a voice to talk directly to 10 Downing Street."

His decision to launch a 10 Downing Street YouTube channel has also been praised fro showing “that those in charge are willing to meet young people in their own environment”.

Praise indeed.

Whether young people came to have a look is another matter as is whether people do feel that the ePetitions service is giving them an effective voice in Government.

Nevertheless, this is clear evidence that new media is offering up new channels of communication between politicians and public, which are being used at least to some extent. And hopefully this is playing some small part in strengtheing our democracy

Little Progress

Just a couple of quick updates. I’ve got a couple of
filled in questionnaires this week; one from Kevin
Davey at The Innovatory and the other from Councillor
Chris Kennedy. I’m still waiting to hear back from
Gary Francis at HCVS and the news from Shaun Saunders
is that I should be receiving some material back from
his youth groups next week.

I spent yesterday trying to get hold of more
organisations around Hackney that work with young
people. I think I must have sent off about thirty
e-mails but so far there hasn’t been much of a
response. I’ve got to give a woman from the scout’s a
call this evening though so hopefully that lead will
go somewhere.

Obviously time is really starting to press as there’s
only two months to go now before I have to hand the
dissertation in. I’m basically going to give it
another week and then draw a line. Hopefully there’s
enough material with which to build a good argument.

Busy Busy

I’ve had a pretty busy week as I had to do an extra day and a half at Propeller this week, in addition to my normal three days. It was all in a good cause though as we seem to be on a bit of a roll in terms of attracting new business. Hopefully, this week’s pitches and meetings will prove as successful as other recent ones although of course the extra hours take time away from working on the dissertation. It looks like next week will be similarly busy so I can assume a load of fun evenings playing catch up are on the horizon.

Anyway, I did get some marks back from the optional modules I took in semester two, at last. No complaints overall and I’m still on track for a distinction, provided I do a good job on this research. Speaking of which, a couple of completed questionnaires have landed on the doormat. I’ve also been to see Sean Saunders who heads the Methodist Circuit in Hackney. He’s getting his Ministers and some young people to take part. Gary Francis at HCVS should also have some questionnaires for me by Tuesday.

I’ve also had a call from Chris Kennedy, who’s a Councillor. He should be sending his completed questionnaire some time this week. And finally, Sally Scott from the Hackney Gazette has also sent me a completed questionnaire. Wow! A journalist has answered.

I’m kind of hoping that the weather will be as bad tomorrow as it has been today. That will give me a good excuse to start looking through the data I’ve collected so far as well as finalising a product outline for a new online PR service that I’m working on for Propeller. I’m sure Clare will love me for it.

Hydro Hackney

A good piece of PR for Hackney Council on Page 8 of tonight's londonpaper. It seems the councillors are doing their bit to go green by switching all their electricty supply to renewable sources - and saving £500,000 in the process.

Of course, what we don't know is how much electricty was being wasted and whether cutting use could still help further. But we shouldn't be too cynical so a big well done to all concerened. I would have liked to link to the full story but the press release doesn't seem to be up on the Hackney Council site yet. If it's there soon, I will.

Meanwhile, I have emailed my questionnaire to the Hackney Gazette. They seem to have been the least forthcoming people on this project so far. Like a lot of journalists I suppose they are working under coinsiderable time pressure. Then again, who isn't? I'll just have to be persistent ... again!

The Tenth Politician

A quick visit to Hackney Town Hall this morning to pick up the questionnaires left by Councillor Desmond. Luckily there was no repeat of the saga with Coucillor Siddiqui’s questionnaire of a few weeks ago so today’s collection was problem free. I’ve now got ten questionnaires filled in by Councillors which means I’m still short of my 25 per cent target but I think I will just have to work with what I’ve got (plus the answers coming from Speaker Khan)

I’ve also forwarded the youth questionnaire to Gary Francis at HCVS so we’ll see how that all goes.

The rather exciting period of sorting through all the data and adding up the results is approaching. That’s when all this will actually start to get interesting as the information I’ve collected starts to throw up some patterns of thought (or maybe not) on different stakeholders perceptions on the potential of new media as an effective channel for political communications.