MPs excited by the possibilites of Twitter

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The impact and effectiveness of social networking sites was the theme of a Hansard Society event last night.

On the panel were the Labour Party's 'Twitter tsar' Kerry McCarthy MP, Lib Dem MP Jo Swinson, Conservative activist Iain Dale and Andrew Walker from Tweetminster.

The debate looked at whether in today's modern age of technological communication Twitter is a necessity or pointless vanity.

For me, the highlight of the evening came from a middle-aged gentleman in the front row.

After patiently listening to the panel explaining the virtues of the site for around 40 minutes he asked "so what exactly is this Twitter?"

Andrew Walker provided the most succinct response, describing it as a wall of text messages that you can share with friends and the wider world.

The panel resoundingly agreed that without doubt Twitter is an effective communication tool.

For politicians it has the added benefit of making politics feel accessible and our politicians look human.

It also has the power to mobilise numbers almost instantly, as we saw last week after Jan Moir's badly thought out article on Stephen Gately.

If used as a public space, which it is, Twitter and its fellow social networking sites provide MPs, researchers and the wider political community with an opportunity to connect with the public in a way that hasn't been possible before.

However, it also creates a new set of problems.

The first issue for many politicians will be opening themselves up to personal criticism on absolutely anything they choose to tweet about.

Why is the foreign secretary tweeting about the X Factor? Why is my local MP at a lunch instead of being in the House?

Why doesn't Jo Swinson know that Scotland just got knocked out of the World Cup (a story shared by the MP at the event)?

Furthermore, most of the panel agreed it was important for a genuine voice to come across.

Getting your nephew or PA to tweet for you just simply wouldn't be good enough and would sooner or later result in problems.

Twitter, and other social networking sites, were used by US President Barack Obama to mobilise political movement during his 2008 campaign.

Kerry McCarthy said she was in the US campaigning for Obama with people who had been recruited through social networking sites.

However the panel largely agreed that that kind of phenomena would be unlikely here in the UK and conventional campaigning that would win the next election.

Iain Dale summed up: "Parliament 2010 will be much more connected, that is for certain."

The verdict last night was clear: Twitter enhances communication, allows politicians to be accessible and present a human side but it is not going to be a replacement for door knocking and conventional campaigning techniques.