ORG parliamentary and policy update

If you want to subscribe to our weekly email, please do so here.

Purpose

ORG wants to monitor UK and also EU policy developments, and make sure our activists and allies are properly informed about debates and developments.

Specifically we wish to:

MPs and MEPs

  • Develop detailed profiles and histories for individual MPs and UK MEPs
  • Understand their viewpoints
  • Help our supporters understand their local representatives
  • Find who we need to influence

Policy

  • Alert people about relevant policy and parliamentary timetables
  • Track developments to help us intervene more effectively

Who and how

ORG will advertise for volunteers and interns to help. ORG staff should help.

Local groups will be encouraged to monitor their local representatives and ask for comment, commitments and help on our issues.

Individual supporters can help by building the profiles of their local MPs, including quotes from correspondence and press statements.

Alerts

RSS searches from They Work for You is a good way to start: these have been converted to email alerts to an ORG email address.

Suggested general keyword searches include: "internet" "cyber" "computer" "web"

What

Wiki

The project should keep Bill pages, politician profiles, committees etc all updated with relevant information.

Email list

The emails will be available via an email list here.

Email Editorial preferences

Upcoming Consultations and committee inquiries

Make sure these have deadlines and contact details

Use descriptive titles, eg "XXX Bill Second Reading"

Titles should indicate to a casual reader why the section is of interest

All information must be placed on the relevant wiki pages

  • Any content in the email must appear on the issue page, and any individual's page of the ORG wiki
    • This helps people find the information and for ORG to keep track of what is happening over time
    • People need to track by MP and by issue
  • Wiki pages should be fuller, and more analytical, than the email

Link to Wiki pages

Link to the relevant Wiki pages, where the topics should be properly covered.

Place relevant external links on Wiki pages

Please make sure that relevant links are recorded on the Wiki pages for further reading.

Use headline markup for titles

Use the equals-sign style mark up for "H2" or "h3" rather than "bold" mark up. This makes it easier to read the contents to see what's covered.

Make sure the reason something is relevant is mentioned

Remember that people won't know everything you do. So for instance, don't say "This Bill has a second reading on X date". Say also, "this Bill will make these changes that we are interested in".

Prefer the theyworkforyou pages for references

Annotate TWFY pages if relevant

  • They Work for You allows annotation; thus ORG's wiki can be referenced back where relevant

Link to timetable information to the ORG public calendar

Punctuation: use double quotes

What should be covered

  • Questions and debates in the Houses of Parliament that mention ORG issues.
  • Developments in committees
  • Relevant legislative timetables, for instance

Less interesting or don't cover

  • Internet infrastructure questions, investments, etc are not as interesting to us, unless there are clear rights questions

Timetabling sources

Committees of particular interest

Note, Bill committees should be covered under "legislation", as they are ad hoc

All Parliamentary Groups of interest

Departmental and ministerial work

Lobbying information

  • Information from Who's Lobbying to see who is trying to influence public policy

Upcoming timetable information

  • This is very helpful for ORG and others to plan work.
  • This can cover all aspects of policy work, from consultation deadlines to Parliamentary debates

Wiki updates

  • Keep pages on relevant committees updated
  • Quotations, with citations (references linking to TWFY), on relevant pages. Usually this should be the individual politician's page.

Weekly email content

The week's developments should be put in the email. The email will go to this public list every Friday. Fridays are best as Parliament is not sitting so the week's work can be compiled without missing anything.

The email should particularly aim to give relevant ORG Wiki and website links.

The content can be structured like this:

ORG's work

  • Any major meetings ORG has had with policy makers can be referenced here

Departmental and ministerial announcements

  • Any important statements or changes from Departments and their ministers

Debates

  • Details of debates that took place

Committees

  • Any relevant committee work

Parliamentary Questions

  • Details of any relevant PQs tabled or answered

Upcoming consultations and debates

  • List of relevant dates, expected debates etc
  • Any relevant advance published consultation responses from ORG

Legislation

Government bills

  • Details of any legislative measures that are currently being looked at
  • Title: Bill name, reading or stage,

Private members bills

  • Deal with private members bills separately

Legal developments

  • If there are any relevant legal developments we hear about, they can be included

International

  • Details of international trade negotiations
  • CETA, ITU, WIPO, IGF Baku

Internet companies

  • Policy news relating to major Internet companies

Timetable information

  • Future dates of policy events
  • Link to ORG's public calendar

Media

  • Synopsis of any major stories about ORG or anything new about the issues above

ORG Contact details

  • Information about who to contact at ORG about any of these issues or for further help
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