Following on from my last couple of posts about Blackpool Youth Question Time, I’ve taken a bit more of an interest in the politics at play in Blackpool. I’m currently following both Blackpool Conservative Councillor Paul Galley and Labour Councillor Chris Maughan on Twitter as a result of the event, which is why I was a bit miffed when I realised that neither of them had tweeted about today’s budget meeting for 2012/13.
As some of my readers will know, the setting of the budget is an important event as it dictates what money will be spent in the area, on which services and approximately when. With the council having to find savings at every turn in the current economic climate, this year’s budget is something most of us are going to be affected by one way or another and I was disappointed to realise that we weren’t being kept in the loop regarding it. In fact, the only reason I knew the budget meeting was taking place today was because I saw this tweet;
At this point, it became alarmingly apparent that there was barely a scrap of information available about the meeting even taking place today. I dug a little further and realised that neither the council home page, or the local newspaper found the meeting to be newsworthy. How disappointing!
Having just popped back to the council’s site, I’m pleased to see this post about the budget taking centre stage, but is it really enough? It smacks of ‘too little, too late’ to me.
In this day and age, information availability is key to success and I feel on this occasion the council let themselves down. Not only was there a lack of transparency about this meeting taking place, but also on it’s importance and impact on Blackpool residents. What I’m really trying to say is that for whatever reason, the online coverage of the budget meeting was poor, if not non-existent and I don’t think that’s acceptable.
There are examples all over the show of other councils doing a brilliant job of providing real-time event coverage (here, here and here), and if Blackpool Youth Question Time was anything to go by (being broadcast live on the web with live tweet commentary) it’s not like Blackpool Council lacks the resources to be able to pull off a live broadcast, or updates & tweets live from a meeting, so why didn’t they use what they had at their disposal?
I’d really like to see better coverage of these key events in the future and I know Blackpool Council can do it, because I’ve seen it done! Perhaps this gap in quality, reliable coverage is the perfect opportunity for a hyperlocal news outlet? Here’s hoping.
Lally.
Hello Lallyd, that is an excellent article and you are right I should have twittered that the budget was on today and I’m kicking myself for not doing it.
On the subject of webcasts I totally agree with you, Blackpool Council should broadcast the budget and all Town Hall debates and even Forum meetings and I’ve called for this several times since becoming a Councillor last May. The reason they tell me it can’t be done is alot of older people don’t have access to a computer so will be excluded which is nonsense as increasingly alot of older people are using computers and here in Anchorsholme (which has the highest number of retired people in Blackpool) we have one internet cafe at the local post office set up to train “grey surfers”.
Apart from informing people, what it would also do is help to reduce alot of petty party politics that is seen at the town hall which will only be a good thing for Blackpool.
Last Friday I watched the budget debate from Lancashire County Council through a webcast so it’s not rocket science to do and as you say it’s something alot of other councils do. I will continue to campaign for it and will keep you posted how I get on (ask Chris to as well).
Cheers
Paul
PS I promise I will be more uptodate with my tweets in future
Thanks for your comments relating to the budget. The process was extremely open and had been subject to advance blogging and soc med updates. The main proposals were first unveiled ahead of the meeting of the Executive on February 8and featured extensively on out @Bpoolcouncil Twitter profile and BLACKPOOL facebook page. The Leader’s blog outline the approach he had taken in coming to his budget. The Gazette featured reports before and after the meeting on line.
The council’s current website does not have any capability for real time updates, but you will be pleased to know we are doing something about that and will be updating our website this year. In a first for the Council, TV cameras were allowed into the Council chamber to film the debate and this was broadcast on Friday night’s North West tonight and also was available on i-player over the the weekend. Sadly though only three people and two journalists turned up to witness the live deb…and those individuals were Council staff who had taken time out to come to Council
Thoroughly agree with all points made!
There is no excuse for the lack of coverage of the council machinations other than a desire, perhaps, of councillors to keep it a secret such that they are less likely to be held to account for what they say or how they vote.
There must be a better way of following the politics of the town than relying on Shelagh Parkinson’s selective memory and interpretation of council press releases.