Online campaigning has scored its 'first real victory'

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Following the government's surprising u-turn on the declaration of MPs' expenses, campaign groups have claimed that public pressure online has forced government to change its mind. Mike Lowe reports

Online campaigners have now seen their efforts rewarded after the government's surprise u-turn over the publishing of a detailed breakdown of MPs' expenses. Although online campaigning is not new, with devices like e-petitions and Facebook campaigns being used for a multitude of topics, the government's decision to allow the publication of a detailed breakdown of MPs' expenses could be seen as a huge victory for the internet age after thousands of people appealed against it.

The row over expenses followed a long-running Freedom of Information (FoI) case in which campaigners sought to get details of MPs' expenses, which totalled £87.6m in 2006/07, published. Last year the High Court ordered the House of Commons' authorities to publish details, including all receipts, to back up claims made by 14 MPs under their second homes allowance.

It was then expected that all MPs' expenses details would be published but the Leader of the House of Commons, Harriet Harman, told MPs last week the government was bringing forward a plan to exempt MPs' expenses from the scope of the Freedom of Information Act. This would have seen expenses published under 26 headings but not the details of claims for individual items.

However, shortly after the end of this week's Prime Minister's Questions, the government revealed the vote on the FoI proposal would not take place. Harman says the vote had been abandoned because of the "lack of cross-party support" and confirmed she would hold further discussions on how to proceed. But she defended the policy, saying it would "provide a legal underpinning for a package of changes which would achieve greater transparency in the publication of what MPs spend".

Yet the organisations fighting to reverse the original decision reckon it was the power of the internet that forced government to scrap the vote. Since the order was published on 15 January, campaign groups like Unlock Democracy, MySociety and enoughsenough.org have been fiercely campaigning for MPs to vote against it. Their greatest force, however, was the unexpected number of people who joined in and helped to garner support by contacting their local MPs and the rest of their online friends to spread the message.

Unlock Democracy says it has reports of MPs receiving "dozens of letters" and MySociety says emails have been received by over 90 per cent of all MPs.

Peter Facey, director of Unlock Democracy, says it was "a clear victory of people power" as tens of thousands of people "wrote to their MP, jammed the House of Commons switchboard, emailed, texted and tweeted their friends, blogged and signed up to the various internet protest groups".

"The rules have changed in the information age," he claims. "The campaign that Unlock Democracy, enoughsenough.org, mySociety and dozens of others were able to mount within hours of the order being sneaked out last Thursday would have taken weeks 10 years ago. Politicians from across the political spectrum need to learn from that."

Commenting on the news in his blog, Tom Steinberg, MySociety's founder and director, says: "This is a huge victory not just for transparency, it's a bellwether for a change in the way politics works. There's no such thing as a good day to bury bad news any more, the internet has seen to that.

"Over 7,000 people joined a Facebook group, they sent thousands of emails to over 90 per cent of all MPs. Hundreds of thousands of people found out about the story by visiting TheyWorkForYou to find something they wanted to know, reading an email alert, or simply discovered what was going on whilst checking their Facebook or Twitter pages. Almost all of this happened, from nowhere, within 48 hours, putting enough pressure on parliament to force change.

"Make no mistake. This is new, and it reflects the fact that the internet generation expects information to be made available, and they expect to be able to make up their own minds, not be spoon fed the views of others. This campaign was always about more than receipts, it was about changing the direction of travel, away from secrecy and towards openness."

The Conservative blogger Iain Dale adds that this was "the first real victory for an online political campaign in this country".

In his blog he says: "Over the last few days it has really sprung into life, without much traction in the mainstream media. That level of lobbying has now paid off and all the sites and blogs which took part in this campaign have scored a real victory."