New rules give attendees the right to tweet, blog or film council meetings in England after complaints from reporters and community bloggers that they have been prevented in the past from showing what really goes on behind closed doors.
The Openness of Local Government Regulations, brought in earlier this month by Local Governments Secretary Eric Pickles, will bring councils “into the 21st Century” and should put a stop to what the minister described as “active resistance among some councils to greater openness”. The new rules apply to all public meetings, including town and parish councils and fire and rescue authorities.
There have been numerous examples of spurious reasons why council meetings should not be reported digitally; one council banned filming of a planning committee meeting on “health and safety” grounds, another because of potential “reputational damage” and another because it was a breach of “agreed protocol”.
Meanwhile, Stamford Town Council placed a ban on journalists tweeting from meetings due to the risk of them “not accurately portraying a debate” and a blogger in Huntingdonshire was removed by police for filming a meeting.
According to Mr Pickles, the new law builds on Margaret Thatcher’s successful Private Members’ Bill from 1960, which allowed for the written reporting of council meetings by the press. He said that that local democracy needs local journalists and bloggers to report and scrutinise the work of their council, and increasingly, people read their news via digital media.
Mr Pickles added that the new ‘right to report’ goes hand in hand with the Government’s work to stop unfair state competition from municipal newspapers and to promote the independent free press. The new law, he said, will change the way people see local government, and allow them to view close up the good work that councillors do.