Forum Topic

Paper v Electronic Communication

I went into the Money Shop in West Ealing. There was no written information by leaflet or notice of their interest rates on short term loans. Is that legal? Try to find out the cheapest method of travel in London. The old TfL leaflets explaining these complex pricing structures I understand are no longer available. Even the London Borough of Ealing would prefer you respond to an complex electronic communication on an electronic response sheet; see Local Development Framework Consultation now current. Have we lost the ability to communicate? Pizza companies still use paper communication. Lucky otherwise many would starve.

Arthur Breens ● 5002d11 Comments

I noticed a house today with a notice in the window about the hospital cuts.  This would be a good way to remind people of a consultation.

Philippa Bond ● 4992d

Do you think that the amount of info requested off you before you get to the actual consultation is excessive?I have found that there is too much data collection going on unnecessarily when all you want to do is report a dangerous pothole or missing drain cover.  The Data Protection Act is also used as a shield to avoid contact with people/doing anything about what people are trying to tell you/just avoid working.If a consultation is only online it is only catching a small proportion of people in a certain category.  What category would you find the people who visit the Council website coming from?  Who visits and what they are looking for most?How would you suggest you reach more people with a consultation?  When they are delivered they don't necessarily arrive (our road didn't get a CPZ reappraisal - and I had to ask several times for one to be sent - the forms were all apparently found dumped somewhere); planning application notifications often seem to go AWOL despite being written on the Council paperwork as having been issued; the post is not as reliable as it used to be and is obviously a lot more expensive than it used to be too and many people just chuck anything straight in the bin(recycling I hope).I suppose everybody could choose to opt in to an online version of a newsletter/magazine if they wanted to.  At least with something on a regular basis you would know if it hadn't been sent for some reason.Otherwise Residents' Associations and the sort of work that you do on here publicising matters so admirably can also spread the word.Only I'm not that sure that the Council really wants the word spread.  Isn't it the case that they have to have a consultation so they only bother to do the minimum?

Philippa Bond ● 4992d

LBE had a parking consultation again online. I only filled in the comments section I wouldn't be taken down the garden path.What I was trying to say was that given the nature of deprivation some areas have very low rates (20%) of connection to the internet and given an average connection rate of around 70% other areas must have a very high rate of connection. Any consultation based largely on internet access would in some deprived areas "miss the target". Using "inclusion" criteria would that be fair? And by the same token would the results of the consultation be validor indeed legal?

Arthur Breens ● 4993d

Ha ha.  I've just struggled with your last sentence and I struggled with Arthur's that included "online biased consultations".  I think Arthur means online-biased consultations.  Does hyphenating it make it mean what he means it to mean?  It's a sort of eats shoots and leaves situation. (Don't ask me what punctuation that should have.)  I write a lot of rubbish anyway!  :) What about biased consultations? Those really really irritate me.  These are the ones where you think you are being given the chance to say what you want but then find you aren't as the questions are phrased so that the answer that is wanted by the issuer of the consultation is finessed from the consultee. I understand that the writing of these is something taught at university.There is a great paragraph about CPZs and consultations and getting the 'right' answers on the Chiswick site.

Philippa Bond ● 4993d

Hi Arthur,If you're that much against the electronic media and in favour of the printed type, perhaps you should've written a letter into the Ealing Gazette who could have then printed it in their 'Readers Letters' section, as opposed to using the very media you're debating about to make your point!!Joking aside, I do see your point. However, this is the world we live in and it's not going to change. Printed versions of what you need should be available or should be able to be made available. Also, the LBoE should make available all forms of communication into them – I am by the very nature of my work computer literate, but struggle to use some of their forms so I feel sorry for those that struggle to operate around a computer.Working in the Telecommunications sector, I would struggle with the figure of only 21.64% of households having an internet connection in an Action Ward as you quote. This does seem right bearing in mind that in 2010, 71% of London households had an internet connection and this figure would only grow.The biggest and saddest change for me in all this is the loss of basic spelling and grammar skills and the breakdown of the English language as I was grown up to know and love.

Bud Richards ● 4995d

This is sad replying to your own entry but......In one ward in Acton only 21.64% of households have an internet connection. This means that online biased consultations exclude this "hard to reach group". Consultors please take note. Your consultation may be invalid.

Arthur Breens ● 4995d

Thank you for this George. What When How and Why. Umm maybe this is what we see today, many words hiding poorly thought-out ideas.Have we any data about availability to on-line facilities in the population? For instance does a public consultation conducted on-line rule out a certain percentage of the population thereby making it invalid? If the NHS North West London consultation is so long it bores or scares people would it be deemed invalid? Is it sensible to ask people to look at more than 100 pages on-line?

Arthur Breens ● 4999d

Unfair some younger graduates will say, but although many nowadays have to learn presentation skills at UNI I often think their written ramblings and paper mountain products are poor and do not justify their expensive salaries. I sometimes feel some of these upwardly mobile people are too intelligent to realise how thick they are when communicating to people who are thick, or who cannot easily understand English. To be fair some are excellent communicators.I often end up saying ‘Yer wot?. I then have to read it again. Life is too short.What I want in a communication is a date, so often missing. I want to absorb in a couple of sentences the good old fashioned summaries – What, When, How and Why. By the time I have absorbed those summaries I must at that stage have the full overall picture. Otherwise I glaze over, ignore the document flick to another webpage or TV programme etc, etc.In a longer document I want a quick index and if there are references, these to be intelligently presented. Cross references are important. Putting things into context is frequently overlooked.The Ealing Website has many examples of poor communication. Cabinet papers make me groan and I do wish the best senior communicator in the Council would grasp this, but also do something about it. One of the most important elements of good management is the ability to communicate. The English disease is that we are often very bad at it. TV adverts are a case in point.

George Knox ● 4999d

Then try reading the NHS consultation document which is a master piece of poor communication.

George Knox ● 5001d

We haven't lost the ability to communicate; we just do it by different media. I haven't written a letter in ten years.

Susan Kelly ● 5001d

>>Arthur wrote>>(a) Have we lost the ability to communicate? (b) Pizza companies still use paper communication.>>AH replies>>(a) 'Yes' (witness society's increasing number of zombies sauntering blindly along the streets with gaze fixed on their hands and/or an electronic device clamped to their head.)(b) Not for very much longer. ---------------------------------------------------------Some call it 'progress', others see it as mankind staggering towards his ultimate self-destruction.  It's being so cheerful that keeps me going.

Andy Horridge ● 5002d