As the general election draws closer, all three major political parties are increasingly using technology to communicate with the electorate. From the political leaders themselves to their wives and ad agencies, social media, television and apps are all being used to keep voters updated on their policies and opinions. However, when it comes to policy, have the key matters of media and telecoms been overlooked?
According to the former chief policy partner of Ofcom, Kip Meek, all three political parties have failed to fully engage with the complex area of telecoms. Commenting on the upcoming election, Meek claimed that telecoms has become a “policy-making orphan.”
Although the issue of telecoms has been somewhat left behind, one objective that all parties seem to share is the aim to improve UK Broadband networks, although each of them remain in disagreement regarding how this service should be paid for. Other technological issues mentioned by the parties have been how to control data protection, mobile network congestion, file sharers and bridging of the ‘digital divide’, yet none of the above can be classed as policy front runners.
It has also been claimed that the ‘Digital Britain’ report, which came out in June 2009, was commissioned too early.
The current general election is the most likely since 1992 to produce a hung Parliament. Therefore, whilst technology itself may not swing the overall result, it could certainly have some influence and politicians would be wise to take note of it.
While telecoms and digital technology may not be as ‘vote winning’ as various other areas of policy, mobile technology and TV will be two of the most important areas of innovation over the next few years and subsequently, if Britain is to have a major role in the next generation of technology, then perhaps politicians need to pay more attention to them?
