Why MPs don’t blog
2008 November 20
Little news item as an afterthought to the discussion at e-democracy ‘08 over the low priotiy MPs give to blogging as a way of engaging with their constituents (and a kind of response to Iain Dale saying that non-blogging MPs are ‘burying their heads in the sand’)
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More on why MPs seem to be burying their heads in the sand – insitutional intertia from the House of Commons, who are trying to impose the same rules of etiquette that apply in the Commons chamber on the internet.
“They didn’t have any complaints about the party political content, it was the courtesies of the House,” Labour MP Paul Flynn told the BBC News website. “But I have never seen the rules written down. They just rang me up after reading my blog and said ‘you can’t say that’”.
Um I thought that the parlimentry priviliges only aplied with in westminister propper.
And as one of the complaints is comparing some one to a character to DS9 that’s hardly “fightin words” is it – comparing a some one to say Baltar (BSG) and you might have a point.
I agree – it just prevents MPs being able to express themselves. I don’t really see how the personal and the political can be separated like this. As John Worth said in response to Simon Dickson’s blog on this: