Back in 2005, Salford City Council spent (if I recall correctly) around £30000 of taxpayers’ money on signing up to the Councillor.Info website project. John Cullen, then a Swinton South Labour Councillor, was appointed as the Council’s e-democracy champion to encourage his colleagues to sign up for the project. Unfortunately John didn’t set a terribly good example in terms of making use of the websites, and things have stalled completely since he lost his seat in 2007.
As things stand, only 10 of 60 Salford Councillors have signed up to the scheme, and of those 10 only a handful have updated their sites recently. The entire Salford Councillor.Info site is as good as dormant.
When the scheme was launched I gave it a cautious welcome in principle, although the cost was (and still is) utterly obscene. It clearly hasn’t worked. Councillors have not been keen to sign up and I don’t blame them – the format is very restrictive and you can’t say anything “political”. This makes even a regularly-updated Councillor.Info site very dry and dull.
We should call time on Councillor.Info before we sink even more taxpayers’ money into it. This weblog gets many more visitors than my Councillor.Info profile, and it costs (literally) small change to run compared to the thousands of pounds per annum spent on Councillor.Info.
Sorry Tom
I have to agree with the conservatives again. One more waste of money,Trouble is iain were does it rank amongst the other follies they put forward. Yesterday i spent some time talking to the gardners
on the town Hall lawn. Working like beavers and taking pride in there work. And the comments were over the possible site of another mess the funfair.God help us.
Joe
Joe,
That list of joint policies just keeps getting longer!
On the bright side, at least if the Tory/Liberal salami slicer is aimed at projects like this one those fine gardeners you spoke to might have a shot at keeping their jobs if you ever get in.
Remember (to paraphrase Chris Patten): dogs bark, cats miaow and Tories cut public service funding.
On topic, I think blogs etc work best when set up spontaneously and are run with enthusiasm. Perhaps that’s what makes this forum so well read.
Tom.
Tom do I take it then that you’re in favour of the ten of thousands of pounds wasted on Councillor.Info…?
Iain,
I’m never in favour of wasting money.
Having just had a look at Councillor.Info for the first time, I have to say the format wasn’t as bad as I had been lead to believe. True, not enough councillors have taken up the scheme, a good enough reason for it to be halted in it’s current guise.
However the concept is a useful one for both councillors and the electorate if used correctly, and could be enhanced perhaps by yourself and Cllr Cooke leading training on running a blog/webpage for other councillors. This would reduce costs as well.
A different url for each councillor eg cllrjoebloggs.gov.uk might also help things along with access for the public improved. Of course each councillor may or may not have the time or inclination to complete a webpage, so making it mandatory would probably be a bad idea.
Tom.
Cllr Lindley ghosting Blogs for other councillors. Hours of fun there me thinks!