Praise for Tom Brake and how he uses Facebook to engage with his constituents in Carshalton and Wallington:
Tom Brake, LibDem MP for Carshalton and Wallington, uses Facebook. Not especially as an ordinary member, in terms of ordinary (mundane) status reports or poking or that sort of thing, but as an MP … This is a perfect example: Tom updates his Facebook friends on the weather reports and is thanked by five for doing so. It is part of the job of the modern day MP, but it also builds up a link between him and constituents, perhaps earns a degree of loyalty but, most importantly, enforces the idea of the MP as a servant of the community. It is an emergent model that has few adherents so far, however while enhancing the service role it is also in some way a conversation starter and Tom does quite a few of these (as do many LibDem Facebook users and a very small minority of other party’s MPs).
Read more at Darren Lilleker’s blog.
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2 Comments
With the greatest of respect, I don’t want MPs to waste their time updating constituents on the weather. They can check the BBC website if they’re that desperate.
And with the greatest of respect … if you click through and read Tom’s piece you’ll see that he provided people with lots of local detail that isn’t on the BBC website.