Iain Dale's Diary: Nine Lords a Blogging...

Monday, March 17, 2008

Nine Lords a Blogging...

Nine members of the House of Lords have started a group blog valled LORDS OF THE BLOG. It's a six month experiment, arranged by the Hansard Society. Barry Griffiths, the man behind the project says...

Nine Peers have come together from across the House to make short regular entries providing an insight into the business of the House of Lords and to talk about their own activities in and around the Chamber. Members will write and upload material and moderate user comments themselves. Find out why Lord Tyler decries the myth of a golden age of political reporting; Baroness D’Souza’s definition of a crossbencher and what Lord Norton has to say about Iain Dale’s request for nominations for the most fanciable political journalists. For the next six months the Hansard Society will evaluate the pilot, capturing data about the audience of the blog in order to assess its reach and value.

The pilot is funded by the House of Lords and will run for six months initially. The blog has been running on a development site since January to help get the contributing members up to speed. All the posts published during this test period will be available to read. Contributing Members include:

Lord Soley
Lord Norton
Lord Tyler
Lord Lipsey
Lord Dholakia
Baroness DSouza
Lord Teverson
Baroness Young of Hornsey
Baroness Murphy

22 comments:

Anonymous said...: You'll have seen the entry on 14 February about your list of fanciable journos? Are you going to rectify the Lordly omission and do a poll on the most fanciable peer?!; March 17, 2008 2:40 pm
Anonymous said...: How on earth has Clive Soley gotten into that exclusive club ? It could not possibly be on the back of his help for BAA in pushing for a third runway at Heathrow now could it ??; March 17, 2008 2:54 pm
Anonymous said...: No sign of Baroness 'BA Gold Card' Symons then ??

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article3559288.ece; March 17, 2008 2:57 pm
asquith said...: The name is better than the blog, of which I don't think much. But still:

LORDS OF THE BLOG!; March 17, 2008 3:20 pm
Anonymous said...: Lord Norton!

A decent fellow if ever there were one!; March 17, 2008 3:22 pm
Anonymous said...: Do not operate heavy machinery after reading their blog.; March 17, 2008 4:20 pm
Little Black Sambo said...: "Funded by the House of Lords". Why does it need "funding" by anybody? Can't they just write it like other people?; March 17, 2008 4:22 pm
Tim said...: This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.; March 17, 2008 4:49 pm
Anonymous said...: "The pilot is funded by the House of Lords".

So it will be gold plated laptops and blackberries all round I suppose.

How can this need 'funding' one asks?; March 17, 2008 4:56 pm
Anonymous said...: Ok, I thought, give it a go.

Here, programme, to me, find the feed boy, go on, go on.

Oops.

No feed. No RSS. No Atom.

No good.

Lordy, Lordy.

STB.; March 17, 2008 5:16 pm
Anonymous said...: Lord Norton - what a legend!

He was my tutor for a few years and I can confirm that he is indeed the 'decent fellow' described by Anon at 3:22pm.

He was Professor Norton when I arrived, Professor the Lord Norton of Louth when I left, and now a Lord of the Blog.

Where will his ascent to the top lead next?; March 17, 2008 6:34 pm
Anonymous said...: This is yet another copper-bottomed, ocean-going example of the government wasting our money. As others ask, what funding could possibly be needed for this? And why do it at all at State (for which, read our) expense? If these 'Lords' - btw, none of them seem to be especially 'noble', just superannuated ex-politicos - want to blog, by all means, let them do so (if they've nothing better to do all day) - BUT not at our expense. What value can this possibly have? What purpose will it possibly serve? Answer: None; and None.

Off with their ignoble heads!!; March 17, 2008 6:51 pm
Anonymous said...: No sign of "Baroness" Jay or "Baroness" Scotland, I see. I wonder why these two mental giants were left out?; March 17, 2008 7:01 pm
Mark Valladares said...: Iain,

If you check the list carefully, Baroness Scott of Needham Market has been added, although she's been placed in the general list rather than the Lords list.

And for the record for those carping about the cost, Ros's blog "Because Baronesses are people too" (www.baronessrosscott.blogspot.com) is on Blogger and costs nothing to the public purse...; March 17, 2008 7:01 pm
Anonymous said...: Anonymous 5.16 - 'no RSS' - must be looking at another blog. There is RSS. As for funding, I presume it is for the Hansard Society to run the pilot. I doubt if it costs that much, not least as the society is a charitable and not a commercial body.; March 17, 2008 8:16 pm
Anonymous said...: Colin's grasp of the political system appears rather slim. The blog has nothing to do with the government. He also clearly hasn't read the biographies of all the contributors - or indeed some of the comments on this post!; March 17, 2008 8:18 pm
Anonymous said...: Colin's post exemplies the ill-informed rant that all to often appears on blogs. Why do people like this parade their ignorance? It's not a government-funded initiative, I doubt if it costs much, and it utilises contributions from a range of peers who are busy (look at Hansard]. Mind you, it is easier simply to express a view than bother doing any research.; March 17, 2008 8:42 pm
Anonymous said...: Colin asks: what purpose will it serve? Having looked at it, I think it will be rather useful - at least it is good for someone in Parliament to try to engage more with those outside. Given that it has only gone live today, it is not a bad start.; March 17, 2008 9:12 pm
Anonymous said...: In response to posts by Anonymous at 8.18 'the blog has nothing to do withteh government' and 8.42 'It's not a goverment funded-inititive' , I quote directly from iain's original post:

"The pilot is funded by the House of Lords".

In case anyone thinks I don't underdstand the difference between Parliament and Governemt funded expenditure, I do: I simply remark - in the end, it's all taxpayer's money. After all, where does the House of |Lords get its money? And I wonder who dominates the committees which determine Parliamentary expenditure. Ooooh - tricky!

I rest my case.; March 17, 2008 9:43 pm
Anonymous said...: In response to Anonymous posts at 8.18, 8.42 amd 9.12, what none of you seem to have grapsed is the central point of my post: why do it at all? Any answers to that? No, I thought not.

Granted the sums of money are small - but it exemplifies in a pure fashion this decrepit Labour administration's attitude towards public expenditure - which turn a remarkably blind eye to what benefits might acrue to the public at large from such expenditure.

Anon 9.12's asserttion that 'it might be rather useful' frankly doesn't cut the mustard to those of us being robbed blind of 40% of our basic salary or other income.

The underlying point- which all the Anons have singularly missed - is that we really need to apply a harsh test to all public expenditure in order that we can rein back that which is wasteful, unnecesessary or extravagant. Now, who can possibly disagree with that??; March 17, 2008 9:59 pm
Helen said...: Another corporate blog. And then we wonder why the blogosphere in Britain has not acquired the influence it has in America.; March 18, 2008 1:02 am
Anonymous said...: Just in case anyone is still reading this thread, Colin doesn't, despite what he says, understand the difference between Parliament and Government. The House of Lords is not wholly funded by the taxpayer. What the recent story about Baroness Symons and the hire of banqueting facilties in the House of Lords completely misses is that the banqueting and similar facilities generate a large profit which is then fed back into the public purse.

I could go on, but I won't...; March 20, 2008 3:49 pm