Apologies for the later-than-usual upload.

This is a copy of my weekly blog which I write for work and is published on the council's intranet.  The views I express in this log are my own, professional, views as the Head of Communications but do not necessarily reflect those of the authority itself.

Hello.

Our overarching holistic strategic governance framework for eradicating confusion and complication in council communications will be put to the test later today by the BBC and a famous comedian.

But of course, I wouldn’t dare use that kind of language with them.

We’ve been chosen (is that the right word?) to take part in a film that Arthur Smith is making for the One Show.

The work we’ve started to better promote and encourage the use of plain English has been highlighted as an excellent example (how nice!) by the Plain English Campaign and when it was approached by a One Show producer, it didn’t hesitate to recommend us (how nice again!).

Mr Smith, possibly most well known for appearing in the Grumpy Old Men TV series, isn’t happy with the over-use of jargon and ‘flowery language’.  He’s the kind of man who calls a spade a spade rather than an ‘implement for the purpose of digging’, etc.  Anyway, the film he’s making is all about this very issue and how many people are confused by official communications.

We’re involved because we agree with him and are doing something about it.

Mr Smith and his crew are coming to watch one of our plain English workshops to see for themselves what it’s all about.

It should be fun and it’s great PR for us too.  I’m not too sure when the item will be transmitted, but I will update you in a future log.

Chief executive communications now.

Thank you for all your feedback from last week’s log regarding how the announcement of Tom Riordan’s appointment had been handled.

It seems most of you thought it was handled well.  Trudie in the regeneration team sent me this email which summed up your general thoughts:

"When I first read of the new CE's appointment last week, I meant to email you then to thank you for informing council staff first.  I think that's the first major issue I've found out about internally, rather than reading it in the local paper."

Excellent – that’s good.

Some of you have highlighted the fact that not all of our colleagues sit in front of a computer all day and therefore don’t have access to the portal or intranet.

Yep, that’s fair enough and is something I’m acutely aware of.

Hence that’s why I wanted to expand on the issue of internal communications this week and ask for your ideas about how it could be improved.

So, we’ve got the portal and the intranet and there’s Staffnews, Team Talk and In Brief – but which ones of those channels are working?  Could we do more?

We already know that the majority of our colleagues would prefer to be briefed about issues important to them or their job in face–to-face meetings with their managers, but we also know that not every manager does meetings.

We refreshed Staffnews last year so it had more of a people focus and we’re about to review it again.  We’re evaluating its impact and looking at how it is distributed.  Right now, a two-page version is posted (along with pay slips) to about 6000 members of staff but the longer 16-page version is only uploaded on the intranet.  Perhaps we should be posting the 16-page edition or only producing an electronic version?

Your ideas are welcome please.

I would like to go further.  For me, internal communications needs to be more about staff engagement and that’s something I want to focus on this year.

But if that’s the case, I need people like you, loyal reader, and our other colleagues to be … ahem … engaged or at least feel involved.

I’d like senior officers and politicians to take part in regular online, live discussions with staff, for the council to have a proper and formal staff suggestion scheme and for us to use our internal communications so we all better understand what each other does and the services we work for.

After all, we’re supposed to be ‘one council’.

Any comments, thoughts, brainwaves or ideas you have can be emailed without hesitation!

Finally, I like to mention some of the strangest requests we get from the media and this example is probably the best from the last week:

Me: ‘Hello Andy speaking.’

Sean Stowell: ‘Hello Andy, it’s Sean Stowell here from BBC Look North.’

Me: ‘What can I do for you?’

Sean Stowell: ‘Look, could you do me a favour please?  We need to do a quick bit of filming outside of the city museum tonight ahead of the event we’ve got there tomorrow.  We need to make it look like we’re doing it all on the same night but we can’t because of problems with the graphics.’

Me: ‘Yes …’

Sean Stowell: ‘Well, can you leave a light on in the window above the café tonight so when we film it looks like someone is there?’

Me: ‘Umm, unlikely as I’m not in charge of the light switches in the museum and it’s closed on Mondays, so there probably won’t be anyone there!’

Sean Stowell: ‘Oh.’

Need I say more.  The BBC.  Demanding as ever.

Until next week, keep your polling cards safe.

Commercial radio journalism isn’t dead. For GMG Radio, local news is a big point of difference and plays a major part in giving the BBC networks a run for their money. Yes, they can outspend us, hire big-name presenters and back-them with glitzy, multi-platform marketing campaigns. But one of the few things the BBC can’t do is out-localise us. Local news is an area where we can connect, engage, build loyalty and win.

It’s not cheap and requires an investment but it’s something we think is the right thing to do. Music is no longer a given in defining stations in crowded marketplaces - it’s what goes on between the songs that matters and creates the sticky connection with audiences.

Every day, GMG Radio’s newsteams produce more than 300 bulletins bursting with regional content that’s relevant to the lives of our listeners. For the regions we cover, our news is a champion and a cheerleader for that patch.

But our remit doesn’t just stop at news bulletin production. We have lots of great journalists who are creating on-air and online features, documentaries and investigations into real life issues that resonate with our local audiences. It was really good to see that commitment to compelling, original content being recognised in this year’s Sony nominations where our North West newsroom was shortlisted for three awards.

Earlier in the year, the need for local news was brought into sharp focus when the snow caused chaos and there was a huge thirst for information.

Listeners knew they could get up to date information on schools, roads and services in their area on our stations – detail that they couldn’t have picked up from a national network.

In the North East when more than a hundred years of steelmaking on Teesside ended with the closure of Corus, our strong regional coverage made a huge emotional connection with the community. Gordon Brown came in to our studios to host a live phone-in with listeners, but it wasn’t Lord Ashcroft that our listeners wanted to talk about – it was local livelihoods and questions from a North East community facing a very uncertain future.

Gone are the days of broadcast journalists simply concentrating on what comes out of the speakers. The digital world gives us so many new opportunities and we now need to be delivering content on different platforms. As well as a microphone, teams now need to be armed with technology that visualizes stories and connects with social media.

The importance being played on news by Ofcom is an upbeat move for commercial radio newsteams – but there are still undoubted challenges. The economy is still in a tricky place and we will need to continue to change to get better.

But, like food and water, we can’t live without news and information. The commercial radio news world might be smaller and more efficient but it is still alive and has just been given a positive shot in the arm.

This is a copy of my weekly blog which I write for work and is published on the council's intranet.  The views I express in this log are my own, professional, views as the Head of Communications but do not necessarily reflect those of the authority itself.

I’m writing my log on the morning of Wednesday April 21, just hours after the first plane landed safely at Heathrow since Icelandic eruptions brought silence to our skies but chaos for travellers.

So does this mean six days of continuous and monotonous coverage by the media is about to end?  You know, reporters broadcasting live from numerous (empty) airports, saying the same thing day after day … ‘Good morning from Heathrow Airport, which would normally be really busy now …’ etc etc

Well thank goodness frankly.  I’m completely bored of it.

Of course, I have not been away on holiday and I’ve not had to spend thousands of pounds on hire cars to get myself home from Outer Mongolia, so I’ve been lucky.  I have no doubt for those people who’ve had to struggle home it hasn’t been a nice experience and I feel sorry for them.

However, if (like my mum) you thought 24 news was repetitive, then the last few days has been repetition-tastic.  I’m sure the BBC’s ‘breaking news’ ticker has been breaking the news for six whole days that there aren’t any flights.

Yes – we knew.

Mind you, there was some excitement yesterday morning on Sky News when, as the reporter was saying the same thing she’d been saying for six days, a man appeared in the shot behind her and starting taking photographs of the departure board.  Eammon Holmes, the anchorman, highlighted this to the reporter and at one point I thought he was going to get her to interview him.

I was also half expecting a Sky breaking news: ‘Passenger seen in airport …’

The ash has also been causing excitement among the local hacks in Leeds and yesterday we had three different reporters from the same paper asking different questions.  I get the impression they were quite disappointed that all of our schools were open and that we were getting on with it, despite the fact some teachers (and students for that matter) were stranded abroad.

At least the ash story means the election hasn’t dominated the news agenda.

Closer to home it has been an exciting week.

We now know the name of our new chief executive and if all goes to plan this afternoon, Tom Riordan’s appointment will be formally agreed by full council.

I was very keen that we broke the news of who our new supreme commander was going to be on the same day as the employment committee made its recommendation and I would like to think we achieved it.

If you were working late last Wednesday, you hopefully noticed that there was something on the intranet within about 90 minutes of the committee reaching its decision and the news was elevated to the portal before 8am on Thursday morning.  We didn’t tell the media until just before 9am and it took the Yorkshire Evening Post (the first to break the story) another 50 minutes or so before it appeared on its website.

I hope you agree with me that at least we did it in the right order for a change.

Clearly, the best way to have announced it would be to have had face-to-face meetings with everyone, but clearly that wasn’t (and never will be) realistic.  However, what I hope is that many of our colleagues got the news first from the council, rather than reading or hearing about in from the local media.

We’ll never get it perfectly right – but here’s hoping we’re trying to get significant news or issues published in the right order, eg you first, media second.  Please let me know if you have a different view OR if you spotted any massive chinks in our armour.

I’m keen to learn from where you feel we’ve failed.

Anyway, welcome Mr Riordan.  We’re a fantastically enthusiastic bunch here at Leeds City Council and we are keen to do what’s right for the people of our city.  I also know there are plenty of people who are looking forward to working with you once you join us sometime in the summer.

Watch out for a Staffnews special which will ‘hit the streets’ next week.

Other issues now and it seems there’s a rift developing between the newspaper industry and the body which supposedly represents it.

You’ll recall from previous logs that I’ve talked about how council newspapers have been criticised by the Newspaper Society for supposedly ‘killing off the local media’.  Clearly, you and I know this isn’t true and About Leeds is hardly a threat to any of the Johnston Press titles around it.

In fact, Johnston Press has said this.

The Society is lobbying government for the rules to be tightened so that councils are banned from producing their own newspapers.

Now it seems the industry actually has a different view and agrees with us, despite what its trade body has been saying.  Trinity Mirror group (it’s a big newspaper publisher) has come out publically to say it doesn’t have a problem with council newspapers, even ones that carry advertising.

Now, there are a few (six in fact) councils which I don’t agree with because of what they are doing with their newspapers.  Frankly I feel they are tarring us all with the same brush and that’s a real shame.

As you know I am a member of the local government communications national executive and a number of my colleagues on the group are pushing for LG Comms to name and shame the authorities who are trying to put their local media out of business.  I think, perhaps (and regrettably) the time has come to do this.  Having said that, it is good to learn that the Newspaper Society appears to be at odds with the companies it represents.  That’s something for us to exploit.

As ever, if you have any views or comments, please let me know.  It is always great to hear from my loyal readers, even if you don’t like what I’ve said!

The people of the Isle of Wight need to be scared tonight.

Tomorrow, I am going to be unleashed on them again, for the first time in over two and a half years, as I read a radio news bulletin.

I'm returning to my 'roots' where I lived and worked for four years at the island's radio station.  It's celebrating its 20th birthday with a special open day for listeners and a number of former presenters and journalists have been invited back to mark the occasion.

I'm really looking forward to returning to see what's been happening since the station was bought by the fantastic management team.

They are a bunch of people who live, sleep and breath the radio station - are passionate about doing proper local radio and most likely do it because its a vocation more than perhaps a career.

Isle of Wight Radio is an example of how it can and should be done.

It was launched in the days when you could still print money at a station with dozens of staff - of course that's not the case now. 

But, IW Radio has always been successful.  It has a loyal following of listeners and a loyal bunch of advertisers who clearly think it provides good value for money and boosts their marketing.  There was a period when it was owned by a massive mainland based company which ruined it for a while - but now it seems like it is back to the 'good old days'.

It has a strong set of presenters, who live and love the island, supported by a hard working team of sales gurus who ensure it continues to thrive financially.

I was there from 1997 to 2001 and it remains the best radio job I've ever had - that's why I'm so excited about going back tomorrow.

It's an interesting time for commercial radio - OFCOM, the industry regulator - has announced new 'rules' for broadcasters.  FM stations will be allowed to co-locate and cut their local programming so long as they provide 'regularly updated' local news.

I think that's criminal.  Radio stations shouldn't be allowed to co-locate and cut local programming.  If they can't make it work financially, then they shouldn't have the licence to broadcast in the first place.  OFCOM's relaxation of the rules over the past year or two means my local radio station now actually broadcasts to me from an entirely different county.  That's hardly 'local'.  It's also a crap listen and the only mention of my home town is when the presenter rattles off the station's oh-so-boring strapline.

Already one large broadcast group with stations across the country has issued a memo to staff hinting that 'now that we have specific information to plan from, it is for us to review it and make some very important decisions on the future shape and size of the company'.

That's code for cutting jobs as far as I can tell.

If the staff of Isle of Wight Radio can make it work, and I'm sure there has been plenty of blood, sweat and tears along the way, then EVERY radio station should be expected to make it work as well - broadcast to and within the area they serve.

I'll be tweeting and 'Andybooing' from the island tomorrow and I may even broadcast my bulletin via this site (if I can get the tech to work!).

Wish me luck!

This is a copy of my weekly blog which I write for work and is published on the council's intranet.  The views I express in this log are my own, professional, views as the Head of Communications but do not necessarily reflect those of the authority itself.

Firstly this week a big 'shout out' to my newest loyal reader.  He is someone who will be familiar to you already.  He occupies a position of great importance in this organisation and is well respected.

Right, that's enough ego massaging.

He is of course ... Councillor Andrew Carter!

He has been introduced to Captain's log only in recent weeks but has told me he thinks it's 'excellent' which is very kind.

There's a story here though because of how Cllr Carter was ‘introduced’ to Captain's log.

He tells me that my log entry of March 16 was 'brought to his attention' (aka 'leaked') by someone in the council who told him that 'you'd better see what he [Andy] is saying about you' - the inference being, perhaps, that he might not like it.

Oh dear.

You'll remember the log entry in question.  It was the one where I reflected on the pros and cons of having the same name as the council leader.  It was also the log in which I recreated the conversation between James Rogers and Cllr Carter where my appointment was discussed.

Oh and I attributed the word 'bugger' to Cllr Carter as well.

So, as a result of all that - is this going to be my last log entry ....?

Well ... no as it happens.

Cllr Carter tells me he read the log entry in question and ... 'fell about laughing.'

Actually, 'fell about' isn't what he said.  It was a bit ruder than that, but given the nervous disposition of some of my loyal readers I don't want to cause offence or upset.

(After all, look at the trouble I caused when I used the made-up expletive 'buggeration' last year.)

I believe Cllr Carter may have even found time to read one or two other log entries as well just to find out what it is I waffle on about.

So, welcome Cllr Carter!

Right, on to other things now.

Today (Tuesday) is an exciting day for the council.  It's because the final round of interviews to find a new chief executive are getting underway.

We will know by next Wednesday afternoon who our new boss is going to be.  Full council is meeting to discuss the appointment on the 21st and once a decision is made, there's going to be a flurry of messages to inform colleagues across the council who it is.

As well as the publication of a Staffnews special, there will be plenty of material on the intranet.

I have dropped hints that at some point in the future, it would be fantastic if the new chief executive would take part in a live on-line forum, say over a lunch hour, so we can put our questions to him or her.

OK, moving on.

There has been some interesting discussion in the media over the last day or two about the 'price' of interviews.

The Guardian newspaper reports how some journalists are now being asked to pay for someone to provide a comment or be interviewed for a news story.

Sometimes expert comment is useful.

For instance, when I was a reporter and I needed an interviewee on say, house prices, I would go to my sales team and ask 'who is your best estate agent client?'

Then I'd call the person they'd suggest and ask them to come on-air.  Usually the kudos of getting their name and business mentioned in a news bulletin was enough to persuade them.

But now it seems cash is king. 

For instance there is a story of an author asking for money despite a newspaper suggesting 'a free plug for their book' in front of 80,000 readers should be enough.

So I've been thinking - perhaps we should apply the same rationale to the way we respond to the demands of the media.

I feel the time has come to introduce a tarriff at the council.  Here's one possible scale of charges:

Cllr Carter/Cllr Brett interview: £250 each
Other executive board member interview: £175
Statement: £20 each

The press and media team facilitated about 300 broadcast interviews alone in the last financial year, so even at the lower rate that could have brought in £5k.

Charging might also stop some reporters asking silly questions about things like why we've not cut a strip of grass less than a metre wide.

I'm sure that the Tax Payers Alliance would be very proud of us - after all we'd no longer be 'wasting money on PR and spin' - we might actually end up making some on it instead!

As usual - if you have any feedback or comments, please email me.

Until next week, enjoy the sun.

This is a copy of my weekly blog which I write for work and is published on the council's intranet.  The views I express in this log are my own, professional, views as the Head of Communications but do not necessarily reflect those of the authority itself.

Well, here we are then.

The world’s worst kept ‘secret’ is out.

Sky News sent me a breaking news text alert at 9.58pm last night (they’ve clearly forgotten I don’t work there anymore) and this morning (Tuesday) a beaming Sian Williams was fronting BBC Breakfast from College Green in London declaring that “in four hours Gordon Brown will be asking the Queen to dissolve parliament so that there can be a general election on May 6”.

Like we didn’t know that already.

Of course, by the time this log is published and you’ve read it, Mr Brown may have already made the round trip to Buckingham Palace.

So, that means it will suddenly become ‘acceptable’ that strange men and women are allowed to kiss random babies and when the buses come along in threes they won’t be the No 1 to Holt Park – they’ll be three election battle buses in a row.

(No, I’ve not been asked to drive any of them.)

If I’m honest, I’m quite excited by all this election malarkey.  No doubt some of you – loyal readers – have been here before and consider it to be a distraction from getting on with the day-to-day business of running our great city.

In the past, I’ve reported on elections and have been so busy planning my coverage I’ve run out of time to vote myself – but being on this side of the fence is quite interesting as well.

This is the first time that a cross in a box on a ballot paper has the potential to have a direct effect on my job, what I do and who I answer to.  And, of course, it could change the direction the country goes in.

Talking of the day-to-day business of running the city – then the election is having an impact there too – well for us anyway.

Until the polls close on the night of May 6, there are restrictions on what my team and I can publicise.  It means, in some areas, where a councillor we work closely with is standing for election, work has dropped off.

It reminds of me of ‘black weeks’ that theatres have – there’s no show taking place, so the staff get on with all the other tasks that need doing.  Sorting out the store cupboard and deep cleaning the dressing rooms for instance.  I remember it well when I used to volunteer at the Theatre Royal in Winchester as a back stage boy.

That’s why last week was nice and quiet, giving us loads of time to get on with other things.  We’ve been tweaking our service plan, working out the communications for when we find out who the new chief executive is and resolving outstanding recharges before the end of the financial year.

So, I’m a bit lacking on the ‘media people who’ve annoyed Andy’ front this week.

Well, apart from a certain reporter at the Yorkshire Evening Post, who didn’t annoy me as such, but did astound me with her bloody cheek:

Andy: “Hello, communications team, Andy speaking.”

Cheeky reporter: “Hello, it’s Cxxxxx from the YEP here. I’ve had a press release from Cllr Andrew saying you’ve removed speed bumps from Wykebeck Lane – can you confirm this is true.”

Andy: “I’m sure it is if you’ve had a release from Cllr Andrew, but I will check.”

Cheeky reporter: “Good, oh, and why you’re doing that can you put me in touch with the residents who’ve complained, so I can call them and do interviews?”

Andy: “Umm … no.  Sorry Cxxxxxx, but you’re the journalist, so you do the research.   Next you’ll be wanting us to do your shopping for you.”

You can imagine the frown on my face after that phone call.

Finally, to end this week, some of your comments, but first let me put one of them into context.

If you’re a regular visitor to the BBC News website, you’ll be familiar with the little box on the right hand side of the page which tells you what the most popular stories are.  Most of the time the order of those stories bears no resemblance to the order of the stories on the BBC’s radio or TV bulletins.

(That’s a debate for another day – what news people are really interested in.)

Right, so with that context, here’s what John from the migration partnership and who used to work in the press office had to say about last week’s log:

“Loved this week’s log. Communications job cuts? … fair enough … DECATS? … OK, I can see why it matters … xxxx [name removed to protect him from embarrassment] brings his kecks to work to dry on the office radiator? … now that’s news I want to hear about (as well as being the best comedy gross-out moment of the Spring.) I applaud Emma for her fortitude and strength of stomach!”

And the man responsible for ‘pants gate’ has also emailed:

“As the team with one of the lowest sickness rates in the council, I'm sure you must be as aware as anyone about the operational difficulties that can sometimes be caused by sick leave. The health and well being of your staff must, at all times, be your top priority.

“As any Victorian would tell you, damp underwear is a leading cause of 'catching a chill'. Pneumonia, consumption, a painful demise and an HR nightmare inevitably follow.

“Therefore, I should surely be commended for ensuring that well-being of 'the team' are always at the forefront of my mind? Running around in wet underwear is a recipe for disaster and asking for trouble. And, possibly, arrest.

“Also, my mother always told me to make sure my undergarments are clean, lest people draw unsavoury conclusions should I be knocked down by a bus.

“I would think her instruction extends to wet underwear, for exactly the same reason.

“Yours, Pantsman.”

What can I say – not much really.  It hardly excuses it though!

Sorry this is late being posted!

This is a copy of my weekly blog which I write for work and is published on the council's intranet.  The views I express in this log are my own, professional, views as the Head of Communications but do not necessarily reflect those of the authority itself.

Hello.

It has been an exciting but also a bit of a depressing week.

Let’s get the depressing bit out of the way first.

I was at a meeting in Malton on Friday (it’s a lovely place, you should visit) of communications people from local government across Yorkshire and the Humber region.  It was our regular catch-up to discuss each others problems, share ideas and work out what we can do as a collective group to help each other deliver value-for-money communications across our respective organisations.

Janet Waggot was there too.  She’s the chief executive of Ryedale District Council (it has only 300 members of staff!) but also takes the chief executive ‘lead’ on communications across the region.  She’s passionate about the subject, understands how important communications is and explained how she has it in her top ten list of priorities.

However, she had a warning.  2011 onwards, she said, was going to be very tough for communications teams in the public sector as the axe began to swing and budgets are slashed.  She predicted that ‘back office’ stuff like our work would be cut first – rather than some of the discretionary services that we don’t actually need to provide but we like to.

OK – I hear you say – this is hardly new news! 

Fair enough, it’s not.  We all know the next few years are going to be very tough and that cuts are a case of ‘not if, but when’.  The good news is that Janet did acknowledge our joint concerns that communications is vital if cuts or service changes are going to be properly explained to residents.

We urged her to take a message back to her fellow chief executives to say ‘we know you can cut us, but we also think you need us’.

No doubt you are having similar conversations in your teams about the years ahead and where further efficiencies could be made.

That brings me on to my next issue this week – DECATS.

(This is the ‘exciting’ bit).

DECATS is a project that the council is currently undertaking.  It’s all about working out what ‘processes’ the council performs and how many people are performing them.  For instance, we now know there are 400-odd people doing admin work across the authority, more than 350 are involved in customer services and over 80 have some kind of marketing, PR or communications role, even if it’s just a tiny part of their job.

The idea of course, is to work out where efficiencies could be achieved, or perhaps where a process could be standardised for everyone.

Last Thursday was the marketing, PR and communications workshop, where colleagues from across the council came together to talk about what we might be able to do to improve communications.

It was a great session and several common themes emerged, including an acknowledgement that perhaps we’re not as joined up as we could be and that maybe we should have a common plan that we all work to.

I’m really pleased that the outcome was positive.  We’ve got some great communications and marketing talent and skill in this council and it seems there’s agreement that we could and should work more closely together in an organised fashion.

Next month, the corporate leadership team is to discuss which of the DECATS themes to develop into business cases.  I’ve got my fingers crossed that marketing, PR and communications is one of them as I’m convinced we could have several quick wins and maybe even save some money along the way.

OK – onto some of your comments from last week’s log.

On the issue of ‘twittering’ from the council chamber and ‘tweeting’ our election results, John from the business transformation team says:  “For some people, short updates from a politician may be a lot more effective than low-quality newsletters and pamphlets.  I reckon many of our councillors could actually benefit from using Twitter to give an insight into what they do for us, and what they believe.  As to tweeting election results, it’s a great idea so long as it’s well trailed in advance so that people are following us waiting for our news.”

Meanwhile, Martin from the Leeds Initiative writes: “good discussion - definitely think we should [tweet the election results] … beating all Dimbleby's in the process.”

And my comments on whether we need the local media in future seem to have upset some of you.  Annie from the Safer Leeds team sent me this: “How could you say that about the local media...? As someone who worked their way through the Yorkshire Post, Calendar, current affairs and documentaries at YTV through 20 years in the days when we did have a truly active, exciting, vibrant, regional and national media based in Yorkshire, I am heartbroken at what is happening to it today. OK, what we have left isn't brilliant, but it's better than nothing and there are some really good responsible journalists out there trying to do their best.  Great that everyone can see the council press releases but lots of viewpoints and voices mean lots of discussion which surely is what democracy is all about - and no Twitter doesn't do it for me!”

Fair enough!  That’s me told!

Finally this week, I wasn’t around to witness this personally when it happened, but it seems the communications team office was turned into a Chinese laundry last week.

The tale goes that one of my colleagues (who shall remain nameless) turned to his nearest colleague and asked whether she would object if he dried his PANTS on the radiator!

Apparently he was going home for the weekend to see his family and hadn’t had time to dry them before leaving home that morning.

I’ll spare you the detail about the size and colour of the two pairs that were placed on the radiator – but it did make me wonder.

As a member of staff we have to reimburse the council if we use the phone for personal calls – but is there a charge for using council heat to sort out your smalls?  Maybe there should be.

I’ll leave it there.  More next week.

This is a copy of my weekly blog which I write for work and is published on the council's intranet.  The views I express in this log are my own, professional, views as the Head of Communications but do not necessarily reflect those of the authority itself.

First this week, I want to put to bed two of the issues that have been ‘on the boil’ for the last two weeks in my log.

Firstly, I’ve had more emails from you regarding my comments about being ‘disappointed in you’ with regard to the Independent’s job losses story.

For the record, I value you all as colleagues and those comments were made to spark a debate, not to be negative about you as individuals.

I still remain much more disappointed with how the Independent and a number of local media outlets (the BBC included) simply waggled a finger in the air and came up with their own job ‘losses’ figures after either using some very dubious maths or a calculator which was missing a few buttons.

Anyway, let’s draw a line under that one now.

The other issue is the council radio station and it seems many of you are in favour and think it is a good idea.  I’ve had several more messages with suggestions about programmes and presenters.

Perhaps the best email was from Au … oh, hold on, he wanted to remain anonymous … from … Mr X in customer services who suggested:

“Exclusion Songs with [someone from Education Leeds].  They could read out letters from the parents of excluded children and dedicate songs to their misguided [offspring].”

“The Saturday Morning Streetscene Show.  The operations managers can review their rotas and forecast which bins will be missed in the city in the following week.”

Ooh, Mr X  - that’s harsh and unbefitting.  No wonder you didn’t want your name printed!

Thanks to all of you who’ve emailed me: the two subjects above seem to have been the ones that have got you most fired up this year so far.

Right, social media and in particular Twitter is back on the horizon again.

“To tweet or not to tweet (in the council chamber), that is the question.”

OK, so I was never good at understanding the finer points of Shakespeare, but it seemed an easy cliché.  That’s because I’ve been working on a report over the last few days about the issue of the use of electronic equipment in the council chamber and whether it should be allowed.

There was a bit of a kerfuffle at the last full council meeting when it seems some members ignored the Lord Mayor’s instructions to have their phones switched off during the meeting.

Instead, they were using them to go onto the social networking site, Twitter.

Whether that’s right, wrong, appropriate or not is one issue, but what is far more interesting for me is the understanding of what Twitter is all about among, how can I put this politely … umm, the age group that most councillors fall into.

This may sound obvious, but there are some fairly defined generational groups who don’t have a clue about Twitter.

My sister-in-law, who’s 21, knows about it but ‘only uses Facebook’.  Meanwhile, my uncle, who’s 45 and considers himself to be a techno/web whizz, also knows about Twitter but ‘doesn’t get why people would want to send short messages about what they are doing’.

He’s missing the point entirely of course (says the man who tweets about all sort of nonsense, including observations about my fellow passengers on the 6.25 train to Leeds).

I know that a number of senior officers and councillors needed an explanation about what Twitter is and what it does even before the question of whether it should be ‘used’ in the council chamber could be tackled.

There are some predictions that the general election on May 6 will be ‘fought and won’ using social media.  Given what I’ve mentioned above, I’m not too sure about this.  Your views are welcome to the usual address please.

My team and I are now discussing whether we should ‘tweet’ the local election results (Twitter wouldn’t be the only way of getting the results out though).  I don’t want to be tweeting just for the sake of it or because it’s the latest social media ‘fad’ to do so.  Instead, I want to be convinced there’s an audience out there who want to receive the information that way.

Finally, we reached a bit of a milestone in our team this last week.

The virtual newsroom is now a year old and we’ve added our first ever non-bona fide newsgatherer to the automatic email alerts system.  We decided to do that given the fact the vast majority of people who are now using the virtual newsroom or are receiving our news via it are not actually journalists.

Much to the disgust of some local media organisations, we’re now having a direct conversation with increasingly large numbers of our residents who aren’t getting information second hand or messages that have been tainted by nasty reporters!

One day, perhaps we won’t need the local media.  Bring it on we say!