At the beginning of each year, I table a question to find out how many items of post were received in the Palace of Westminster in the preceding year. The answer to this year’s question produced some interesting figures, certainly compared with last year’s.
In 2008, a total of 4,135,144 items of post were received in the Palace. Of these, 620,271 (or 15 per cent) were received in the Lords. In 2009, 3,540,080 items of post were received, of which 885,020 (or 25 per cent) were received in the Lords. These figures are somewhat counter-intuitive. MPs are extremely constituency active and are usually inundated with letters from constituents and, indeed, from groups relating to policy issues and legislation. In the Lords, we get briefings on legislation but not the constituency correspondence, hence the disparity between the mailbags. What is surprising, then, is that last year the volume of mail received by MPs showed a marked decline, while letters to peers increased significantly. Increased use of e-mail may explain a decline in snail mail to MPs, but not the notable increase in letters to peers.
I would be interested to know what readers think may explain this notable dip in correspondence to MPs and at the same time increase in letters to peers. Does it reflect a growing awareness of the importance of the Lords? Even if it does, it would not explain the decrease in letters to MPs. Those seeking to brief parliamentarians on legislation will tend to cover both Houses.
Are there similar statistics on how many e-mails were received? Perhaps there was an overall increase in correspondence, for MPs too, but we don’t see it in these figures. Many peers still don’t have e-mail addresses listed, whereas I imagine almost all MPs do. People tend to prefer to e-mail these days, but if there isn’t an address listed they will revert to the post instead. Perhaps you should push for all peers to have e-mail addresses, even if this means messages are printed out and handed to them! Lack of e-mail will only contribute to the (largely unfair) fusty image of the Lords that a lot of the public have in mind.
Jonathan: There has been an increase in e-mail and most peers, I’m glad to say, do have e-mail. Anyone familiar with the formula for parliamentary addresses can fairly easily work out what the addresses are. An increase in e-mail would not, of course, explain the substantial increase in snail mail to peers.
The fact that most MPs and peers do have e-mail has had a notable effect, not just in terms of people outside Westminster being able to contact parliamentarians, but also in respect of internal communication. Indeed, I think its biggest practical impact has been in terms of the activity and growth in the number of all-party groups. It is fairly easy now to let MPs and peers know of meetings.
Over the past year I have used writetothem.com rather than the surgery or snail mail method. I find this an exceptionally good service and James Duddridge MP exceptionally helpful, couldn`t have asked for more from this chap.
Electronic means has taken over in this field and is definitely the future of contact with the House. I think the Lords have had more post this year because more important, to the public, issues have come up for debate and the HoL seem`s the only place where the people involved maybe listened to. The Policing and Crime Bill must have generated a lot of mail, also the Digital Bill.
Labour obviously put forward these bills so if you`ve a Labour MP it`s doubtful s/he`ll rebel. If you`ve a Tory or other MP they`re a minority so you`ll do little good writing. The only place where any hope is left after a Minister puts forward a Bill is the HoL and I feel that people have realised that. Hence bigger postbags for the HoL.
I think it`s time people at home had a “No confidence” button to press regards the Government. Even the Courts don`t make you stay with a partner 4-5 years before a divorce.
The House of Lords are many peoples only hope to have an effect that can drastically affect their lives. It has grown in importance and the internet has helped realise the fact that just because “X” puts forward a bill that need not be the end of it. There is a chance albeit a small one that some Lords may listen to reason. This blog being testament to that.
Carl H: Many thanks for your comments. I hope we are proving more relevant and people are recognising the value of contacting peers. Though my post refers to snail mail, we are very alert to the need to utilise modern technology to engage with the public. As you say, in a very nice tribute to the blog, this blog is one way of engaging and a very good way for us to get input from people outside, in some cases (as with the post on prostitution) getting comments from people who are unlikely otherwise to have made contact.
Anybody who needs to write snail mail any more needs his head testing. Perhaps they think the peers can help.
I have written one snail mail in the last two years, which had to be a hard copy document with proof of delivery.
Even snail mail xmas+birthday cards are a thing of the past.
I ‘wrote’ my first letter to a politician (for want of a better word) via WriteToThem in 2008. I naively thought there was a hope of blocking the Lisbon Treaty. I decided to write to a peer (because my MP is fearlessly loyal to his party) who I’d heard of (and knew something about), was a Cross-bencher, and with quite a low attendance.
I received an acknowledgement from the peer’s secretary very quickly. Her having a secretary was the biggest surprise though considering she was a peer with a “well below average” attendance. Perhaps others regularly have the same thought as me, so she decided it was worth her while getting a secretary. Or maybe some peers share secretaries?
Chris K: One cannot employ a secretary (other than possibly for a few hours a week) on the research and secretarial allowance. Some peers may share a secretary and others may have a secretary that they employ either out of their own pocket or through being able to draw on some secretarial support courtesy of their place of work.
If someone ‘phones me and asks if they can speak to my secretary, my reply is ‘You already are’.
I’m reminded of something said to me by an ex-MP, to the effect that he never ordinarily read his mail nor did his colleges they left it to their secretaries/wives who wrote the pro forma replies and only passed on ‘important’ matters. As you suggest peers don’t (generally) have that luxury.
The change in those figures seems too dramatic to be simply accounted for by trend changes. Has the recording been changed or perhaps a major parliamentary bill(s) lobby effort split the chambers either side of the year with the commons therefore overestimated in ’08 and underestimated in ’09 and vice versa for the Lords?
I can only share my own personal experience.
I wrote to a Parliamentarian regarding lap-dancing [about regulation..] and also chose to involve the House of Lords, because as you may recall with that legislation there was scope for amendments to improve the lack of regulation which currently exists. But without necessarily ‘banning’ it altogether.
So I felt that as I had a more ‘pragmatic’ approach I was willing to ask the House of Lords for a sensible approach given that we were ‘starting from zero’ and anything would be an improvement.
Also ‘banning’ it might not be very effective and lead to un-intended consequences.
What I am trying to say, in a rather roundabout way, is that for legislation which is not ‘Yes/No’ [The Lisbon Treaty..] where there are shades of opinion and one is trying to move it in a general direction and improve the situation [assisted dying might be another example], approaching the Lords in a reasonable way [don’t laugh at the back!], which occasionally I can be, might have a value over and above approaching one’s MP.
Bedd Gelert: Many thanks. Approaching an MP and approaching peers are not mutually exclusive options, especially with a Bill going through. In the past, the tendency has been to contact only MPs, but increasingly people are recognising the value of contacting peers.
it seems that since the so called ‘phorm storm’ and its ‘Deep Packet Interception’ for comercial Piracy of consumers personal Datastreams for commercial profit broke at the http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/03/10/isps_phorm_comment_target_market/ Many stories Bt By Chris Williams.
the only place your average person online can get any werthwhile feedback is the Lords house and the EU Directives the UK laws Must follow
the good lady Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer , and Lord West of Spithead to name but two being so helpful and open to being informed by tech consumer users etc…
see https://nodpi.org/2009/12/31/no-deep-packet-inspection-a-review-2009/ for a very basic overview.
http://ec.europa.eu/justice_home/fsj/privacy/workinggroup/wpdocs/2009_en.htm
http://ec.europa.eu/justice_home/fsj/privacy/docs/wpdocs/2009/wp168_en.pdf
so it would appear most online members of the public will be aware of these facts, and try and make brst use of the lords time were possible, and thank god for your lordships helping and being informed by us, as the other place generally doesnt care…
You Really Need to Do something About Mandy and his trips to boats though 🙂
just a bit of harmless fun
Dear Mandy , Please take note
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_P4lJD_OPI&feature=playe…
Dan Bull – Dear Mandy [an open letter to Lord Mandelson]
pip: Many thanks for your comments. I like to think that the Lords is very good at engaging with people outside the House and taking on board comments that are made. I have been struck, for example, by the quality of the comments on the Digital Economy Bill and have passed these on to colleagues dealing with the Bill. We also welcome suggestions as to how we may improve that engagement.
I am one who has written a few letters to their Lordships because they have actually spent the time required to understand some of the worst pieces of legislation that has been rushed through the Commons, and have put a stop to it.
My MP votes 100% for the government and represents the government to me and seems no longer to be my representative, so letters to him seem fruitless. Maybe there are some others like me that are responsible for this trend.
Alfred: I think the fact that the Lords focuses very much on the detail of Bills, and has members who usually have some understanding of the measures, means that we very much welcome input from those with a particular interest in, and knowledge, of a Bill. I find such material invaluable and often highly educative – as I have found with some of the comments on the blog on a range of issues.
“approaching the Lords in a reasonable way might have a value over and above approaching one’s MP.”
Politician peers have always been exemplary in responding to lobbying.
I did not often write in the days before e-mail, but the pleasure of the reply from a peer, was always considerable.
On a side issue, the problems of e-mail/snail mail replies ,to Authorities of any sort, HAS been quite disagreeable, but the proof of delivery for an e-mail from, for example, a council, or the inland revenue
is no longer in doubt, once the connection has been established.
The full use of the internet by banks, for statements, but the lack of e-mail contact with the manager (in my own experience)
is the most definitive example of how the system should, and should not, be used.
Post to politicians does not need to be secretive; you are dealing with “the polloi/ many”. Snail mail is therefore superfluous.
If you think the post man is steaming open your post, or losing it, then use a pigeon.
The NHS e-mail to GPs service is probably read by the press, before it even gets to the GP at all, via the NHS central messaging system, although the health service denies it.
I last wrote a detailed snail mail post 15 months ago in 2008.
If more people are writing snail mail to Lord Norton, it can only mean that his post is getting more involved with second childhood children, who have been unable to learn how to use e-mail.
Twm O’r Nant: It is important to remember that not everyone has access to the Internet; many of those without access include some of the more vulnerable members of society. It is also worth saying that a letter may suggest greater commitment than is the case with an e-mail: these things can be important when dealing with a large influx of letters and e-mails.
Croft: There was a change in the methodology a few years ago, essentially from estimating the number to counting: that produced a rather dramatic change in terms of the numbers (though not the relative proportions). As far as I am aware, there has been no change in the methodology since. The figures do not include courier items or internal mail, but did not last year either. There is no obvious reason for the increase in mail to peers, nor decrease in that to MPs. Last year was not an unusual year for the Commons or Lords, so we are not reverting to what would be regarded as a normal pattern. The proportion of mail (25 per cent) going to the Lords last year is, as far as I am aware, unprecedented. There is no particular campaign that I can think of that generated notably larger mailbags than campaigns of previous years.
You have a puzzle then! I don’t like unexplained big changes they suggest a problem somewhere. Out of interest are any figures (in general) reported about the parliamentary mail servers msgs sent/received externally? (obviously the admins will have such figures) And if not with the way the trend is going attempts will surely need to be made to have some broad figures public.
Lord Norton “I think the fact that the Lords focuses very much on the detail of Bills, and has members who usually have some understanding of the measures, means that we very much welcome input from those with a particular interest in, and knowledge, of a Bill.”
It is the detail where the real problems are hidden and where the drafters, sometimes unintentionally, show their real intentions. That is why the Commons should scrutinise bills properly and is failing in its duty to do so. That just puts an extra responsibility on the Lords. Rushed legislation and rushed scrutiny has been the hallmark of our current regime
Aren’t we missing the obvious. The work of the Lords is far more visible these days. Years ago I would not have known the work of Lord Lucas in standing up for Elective Home Educators against some strange attempt stamp them out. I would not have seen Lord Stoddart’s regular attempts to highlight the government’s attempted suppression of the EU’s excesses etc etc.
TV, Radio, websites such as “They Work for You” all add to this exposure so some people become aware and thus write in. I do, in support and thanks.
Looking at the figure of 885k recieved in the Lords it does perhaps add to the call from some for the need of a secretary/researcher. If one takes it that the Lords will only recieve allowance for 148 days, that`s 6000 pieces of mail per day. That`s quite a lot of mail to take seriously as well as commitments to reading Bills, Committees and such.
I do wonder if the public do realise fully the Lords worth, if the Lords will cope. Even this blog could become a commitment too far if inundated and we may have to hold elections for users.