Social networking: an effective medium of communication but not without risk

When it comes to reaching certain groups quickly, cheaply and maintaining control over your message, many councillors find online methods hard to beat.

At the recent Cllr’ 10 event, Standards for England and the IDeA ran an interactive session which looked at how councillors can use social networking effectively and ethically to engage with their local communities.

This article highlights some of the key messages from the session for councillors.

• If you use blogs, Facebook or Twitter to help you to carry out your political work, rather than in your private capacity, your obligation to meet certain standards of conduct still applies. You can still be involved in robust political debate and state your opinions strongly – the Code does not exist to gag you or fellow councillors or stop you expressing political views. It does, however, prohibit treating others with disrespect, bullying and bringing one’s office or authority into disrepute. It is important if you are blogging or tweeting personally and not in your role as councillor, that you do not act, claim to act, or give the impression that you are acting as a representative of your Authority. It is worth noting that web links to official council websites may give or reinforce the impression that you are representing the council.
• You may use a blog to draw attention to a particular local issue and call the council to account, as you would in a public meeting.  However, blog entries ridiculing or attacking particular officers, or making serious accusations about their personal competence or integrity, could amount to disrespect, even bullying, in some circumstances.
• It is worth considering that while the immediacy of social media can be a great benefit, it also has a downside. For example, it is possible for you to Tweet on a matter seconds after leaving the council chamber – long before your opponents have issued press statements. This can result in broadcasting spontaneous remarks that may quickly seem unwise. By the time you have reconsidered and deleted them, they may have been seen by thousands, Facebook-shared, re-Tweeted, linked to, and committed to local headlines. That is fine, if you have got this message across just how you wanted to; less so if your post was an outburst in the heat of the moment. Such remarks are easily withdrawn, apologised for and forgotten when made in person, but posting them on the internet means that they have been published, and in a way that cannot be contained.
• It is important to note that good ethical standards are not limited to the Code of Conduct. While you may not be investigated for using online media, your conduct can still attract adverse publicity, even where the Code does not apply. For example, a regional newspaper recently called a councillor’s blog post against a rival party a “toilet-mouthed tirade” saying:

“A [Code] breach it may not have been; childish, crude and demeaning to all who vote or follow politics it certainly was.”

It is clear that social networking sites can enhance political debate and add positively to local politics when used correctly. Click here to see our online guide to blogging.

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