Dear Andrew Slaughter,

It was recently brought to my attention
(http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=117055866653) that Margaret
Beckett, the current favourite for the position of speaker, does not
accept emails from her constituents.

I find this rather disturbing given the widespread adoption and the
efficiency of the medium. I believe that in not accepting contact of
this form Ms. Beckett makes it much harder for her constituents to be
heard, decreases transparency and accountability and shows that she is
disturbingly tied to outdated tradition and naïvely close-minded to
notions of innovation.

I urge you to take this into consideration when casting your vote for a
new speaker.

Thanks for your time.

Yours sincerely,

Adam Zethraeus

The first response:

Dear Adam,

Thank you for contacting Andy. I’m not sure where this information originates, but according to the very website you used to write you email -i.e.  Write to Them – Mrs Beckett received an above average number of emails from constituents and responded to them, getting a medium rating, which is pretty good, considering that the sample size used suggests that she receives an well-above-average numbers of emails!

I’ve no reason to suppose that this isn’t still the case – I suppose it just goes to show that  as well as facilitating communication, people can use the web to spread rumours, inaccuracies and falsehoods…..

Yours sincerely,

John Dawson
Parliamentary Assistant

My second email:

John,

Thanks for getting back to me.

Mrs. Beckett is listed as having no email at http://www.parliament.uk/mpslordsandoffices/mps_and_lords/alms.cfm
Additionally the guardian lists her as having no email address. http://politics.guardian.co.uk/person/contactdetails/0,,-319,00.html
Mrs. Beckett has no website so further verification appears impossible.

The website writetothem.com has been developed from the now defunct ‘faxyourmp.com’. Furthermore, nowhere on the statistics page (http://www.writetothem.com/stats/2007/mps) from which you quoted Mrs. Beckett’s ‘medium’ rating does it state that messages were delivered as emails. It therefor seems reasonable to posit that writetothem.com simply faxes letters written to Mrs. Beckett.

I would greatly appreciate if you could relay our correspondence so far to Mr. Slaughter.

Yours sincerely,
Adam Zethraeus

Second Response

Adam,

You’re right. I’ve just checked with Margaret Beckett’s office and indeed she doesn’t do email. Write to them do Fax their emails over, as you suggest, and she apparently deals with them by post.
I don’t need to relay anything to Andy – through the magic of  server-side rules, mail filters,and forwarding, all our correspondence is already in his private inbox!

Kind regards,

John