Truth about Local Government’s Post

On local elections day, let's look at the reporting of local democracy and how this can be improved. There's at least one quick(ish) win available. Andy Ferrier Chief Executive of Test Valley DC, notes the collapse of reporting by the local media of both council meetings as well as daily council work. How can democracy be enhanced by changing this? Councils need to adapt to how the local media works now - not expect them to adapt to councils. The local media is moving (or has moved) to much reporting being AI-based. They need a feed they can machine-read to generate stories (and still the prompt of proactive media relations, such as press releases). So give it to them. All councils should have a live video feed of all public meetings and, more importantly, a live transcript. The latter is not yet 100% accurate but not far off and it will be better to have to correct the occasional mistype rather than not have reporting. Have these outputs available after the meeting as well as part of the permanent record. Possibly have a 10-second delay to prevent abuse. I envisage being able to sign up for an Anytown BC alert: 'In the last week ‘North End’ was mentioned twice by Members and once by an officer at full Council, once by a Member at Housing Committee and it also appears in three new council documents (two committee papers and a consultation)' - with excerpts and links to all. Council communications operations need to think not just about ‘controlling the narrative’ but taking a can-opener to the often default level of the non-cognescti having to deep-mine for information, or even having such deliberately obscured from them.

ICYMI Our Democracy in Review 2023 report is live on our website. Learn how Cleveland VOTES and our partners defended democracy in 2023 -- and how you can too ⬇ 🔗tinyurl.com/2md9nzpt

RBA Update: Is The Democracy Sausage Still Sizzling? With Robbie Barwick An important update relating to the Section 11 power at the RBA with Robbie Barwick from the Citizens Party. In some really good news, it appears this change will be resisted in Parliament, so we explore how this came about, and the broader issues which his whole episode represents https://hubs.li/Q02mGd2t0

🔴 Live now! ▶ Watch the EnTrust Project debate 'Distrust, disengagement and the challenges of democracy'! We're discussing the 'Guide on Enlightened Trust' and how to redress citizens' distrust in institutions 👇 https://lnkd.in/ews-hSWA

Our 2023 Annual Report tells the stories of EED’s partners defending democracy in the European Neighbourhood and beyond. Read it here: https://bit.ly/3Vr2pXU

On this week’s Burn the Boats, Andrew Yang talks about the problems with America’s political system, and what can be done to fix it in order to defend democracy. Listen now: https://hubs.li/Q02DFhSZ0

In our latest blog our Head of Casework talks about claims made during political party conferences and our expectations of producers in this period 👇 https://lnkd.in/e2gTteaV

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Another brilliant Resistance Bureau session is in the books! Big thanks to Chipo Mwanawasa 🇿🇲 , Oluchi E. 🇳🇬 , Hon. Derrick Nyeko 🇺🇬 and Aisha Dabo 🇸🇳 for sharing their insights on how to build successful democratic campaigns and defend the vote, even in the most oppressive contexts. This is well worth the listen for democracy defenders everywhere. In case you missed it: https://lnkd.in/dHH6xZWU