HM Inspectorate of the Constabulary has stolen the name of a social enterprise, MyPolice, for its new online site. They should find a new name.
Our guest writer is Guy Lodge, Associate Director at the ippr.
What happens when a giant state bureaucracy decides to trample all over one of the innovative social enterprises in Britain? So far, nothing much.To explain: two conferences happened in London today. At the first David Cameron (and pretty much half the shadow cabinet) stood up to talk up their vague concept of a “Big Society“. There remain real problems with Tory thinking in this area, not least the assertion that an active state and a big society are locked in some kind of zero-sum relationship. But since his much derided conference speech last year when he claimed that rising inequality was primarily a consequence of big government, Cameron has at least tried to think more creatively about the role of the state.
Back in November he gave the Hugo Young Memorial lecture when he said that government should concentrate on:
“Galvanising, catalysing, prompting, encouraging and agitating for community engagement and social renewal. It must help families, individuals, charities and communities come together to solve problems.”
The idea that it would be good for the state to help husband and grow small, innovative social enterprises (or at least do them no harm) is something which should unite progressives and conservatives alike.
Sadly, then, there was perhaps a more significant event also happening today, about a 15 minute walk across London, run by the National Police Improvement Agency. There two young social entrepreneurs—Lauren Currie and Sarah Drummond, from the innovative police accountability organisation MyPolice.org—told the reality of how such organisations get treated.
MyPolice is an online feedback tool that enables the public and the police to have a conversation, and help people in local communities identify weaknesses in their policy service, and work with local forces to fix them. Most interestingly, all this data is then fed back to the police to help them improve. In short — a really good idea, and one supported by a range of groups, from Geoff Mulgan’s Young Foundation to Tom Steinberg’s MySociety.org.
The two founders were dismayed to find out recently that HM Inspectorate of Constabulary (HMIC) — the police OFSTED — had decided to launch a vaguely similar site, with exactly the same name. The news wasn’t just irksome, but threatened their very survival: their organisation needs a good google ranking to allow the public to find them, and they had spent a year building relationships under their brand. Both of these won’t happen if a giant bureaucracy gobbles up the name, and creates confusion over who the real MyPolice might be.
That HMIC is investing in public online accountability mechanisms is a great thing — and to be encouraged, even applauded. But it would obviously be better to do this without friendly casualties in the process. And HMIC’s regrettable decision has already got some coverage, with more expected soon.
Rumours suggest that the Conservatives in particular are annoyed about this, given MyPolice are exactly the sort of organisation Cameron wants to flourish. But Labour supporters should be equally put out. We saw something like this happen when the government health website NHS Choices stomped over innovative startups, like PatientOpinion. And now its just happening all over again.
Thankfully, the solution is simple. HMIC should just admit they made a mistake, and change the name of their site. If they don’t, the first, smaller, better MyPolice will get swamped, and it is even possible that one of the most innovative small organisations in Britain could be snuffed out. If HMIC do change their name, everyone wins. And luckily, there are plenty of other good choices out there: OurPolice, YourPolice, BetterPolice, or indeed any one of literally dozens of other choices. Lets hope HMIC see sense, before their reputation suffers.
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47 Responses to “MyPolice impersonation”
Paul Miller
RT @leftfootfwd: MyPolice impersonation – the long arm of the law tramples a social enterprise http://bit.ly/aj1U48
nobby-Lobby
RT @leftfootfwd: MyPolice impersonation – the long arm of the law tramples a social enterprise http://bit.ly/aj1U48
Jon Harvey
I think this is a critical moment for the police service and its developing use of Web 2.0. Today (31/3/10) there has been a lively event (see #polcasm on twitter) opening up more of the dialogue about how best the police can use social media and all the interactivity that the net can now bring. Many public services, including parts of the police, are now actively searching for ways to engage with their publics with fresh media. As anyone who knows about the new media – it is all about what goes around comes around, two way partnerships and a lot of listening. I hope that the HMIC listen to the growing clamour about this (there is a similar article on the ResPublica site to day as well: http://www.respublica.org.uk/blog/2010/03/rank-idiocy) and bend a little. Making space for such third sector organisations as http://www.mypolice.org is critical! The country needs such active and effective citizenship (http://jonharveyassociates.blogspot.com/2009/05/empowered-citizenship.html) – I hope the HMIC sees this too.
jonathon carr-brown
Sorry, but NHS Choices never “stomped” all over Patient Opinion. Infact I hope Paul Hodgkin, at Patient Opinion would agree that we work closely and NHS Choices presence is helping its business model. I was responsible for the “stomping” and I went ahead with a clear conscience because the collection of data is not the important bit of the equation. The important bit is what Patient Opinion does well, and NHS Choice’s can’t do, which is translate the data and train organisations to promote commenting. Patient Opinion takes a feed of all NHS Choice’s comments and uses those as part of its business model. Which for an enterprise which has struggled to get national exposure is kinda important. The idea that the public have to be restricted to one place or medium to comment on public services is a stupid as saying the public shouldn’t be allowed to comment on NHS website. And I’ve had plenty of people express the hypothetical view that people are scared to comment on “official” websites – I’ve got 30,000 people who would disagree. This is a one dimensional view of digital communications which is stopping us working out what to do with all the information we are now gathering. So do me a favour and move on. Patient Opinion has a substantial contract with NHS Choices and benefits from our service. Social enterprises having nothing to fear from government involvement and everything to gain. This debate is about the use of data not the technology that gathers it. The only caveat is that any data collected by government should be openly available and apart from a few areas that argument is won. Yours disgruntled
Jonathon Carr-Brown
Director of Innovation and Strategy
NHS Choices
Naomi
RT @mypolice: RT @leftfootfwd MyPolice impersonation – the long arm of the law tramples a social enterprise http://bit.ly/aj1U48