David Cameron’s political reform plans – and my views

PR Week has a few words of wisdom from me this week, in response to David Cameron’s speech about reforming our political system:

Liberal Democrat head of innovations Mark Pack told PRWeek that Cameron could make even more use of new media to communicate the work of Parliament to voters.

He said: ‘There’s plenty of scope to use technology to improve Parliament’s working and accountability. It’s welcome news that David Cameron has joined the long-standing calls from MPs such as the Liberal Democrat Jo Swinson for parliamentary footage to be available on YouTube.’

He added: ‘The SMS alerts idea is [also] an interesting one, but the really big gain to be had is to open up legislative data.’

Pack, who is soon to join Mandate Communications, said Cameron should back plans to make parliamentary bills compatible with the internet. In particular, he cited the Free Our Bills! campaign.

He said: ‘This will open the door to all sorts of innovation and experimentation in the cause of democracy and good government. Crucially, it will also shift power – the public will be able to decide what to do with information about new laws in formation and when, rather than the data being under the control of the political establishment.’