Blog guidelines for civil servants

Last Modified: 11 Mar 2008
Source: PA News

Civil servants are to get new guidelines on blogging and social networking sites as Whitehall comes to terms with the latest trends on the internet.

The guidelines, expected to be issued shortly, come in the wake of a row over the Civil Serf blog, which closed down last weekend amid reports of a molehunt to find the anonymous diarist who had been spilling the beans on Whitehall life.

But the Cabinet Office said that the new guidance was not linked to the Civil Serf site. Work had been under way since last summer, after a report urged Government to update the way it used information, said a spokeswoman.

In its response last June to the independent Power of Information report, the Cabinet Office said it was time to review how to "maximise the potential value of civil servants' input into online fora".

Teams from the Cabinet Office Propriety and Ethics and Government Communications were given the job of "clarifying" how civil servants should respond to citizens seeking advice online, and told to report by autumn last year.

The Times reported that the delayed report, to be published by Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O'Donnell, will spell out in what circumstances officials should start blogs or use social networking websites such as Facebook and YouTube, and even if they can change details on Wikipedia.

While agreeing that "with the right guidance and training", civil servants can "make a valuable contribution to online debate", last summer's document made clear that they would be expected to keep a tight rein on their comments.

Contributions to online debate should take into account not only by the Civil Service Code but by government communications management policy, which would "determine which public servants have the right skills and remit to make public statements", said the document.

The author of Civil Serf claimed to be a middle-ranking 33-year-old female fast-stream civil servant, and filled her blog with jibes at ministers and complaints about the hidebound practices and boring meetings of Whitehall.

She branded Prime Minister Gordon Brown "Velcro", because of the way problems seemed to stick to him and lampooned Chancellor Alistair Darling's desperation to garner "cheap headlines" with his debut Budget on Wednesday.

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