New Statesman & BT New Media Awards 2001 - If our policymakers are to lead us into the digital age, we should at least make sure they have the money to get there themselves

I feel sorry for MPs. All of them. You may believe them to be conniving, vote-grabbing, freeloading, gin-soaked wasters. Yet they have my unending sympathy - because I was asked to moderate the judging panel for this year's NS awards. "Sympathy" and "MPs" are not words commonly used together. But when it comes to technology, an MP's path is not an easy one, and they deserve our pity. They are disillusioned by, and disengaged from, fast and modern information services.

I work in interactive technologies and I expect some basics when I go into work. I expect e-mail to work without having to manage and pay for IT support. I expect my employers to provide network access that helps me do my job. MPs do not enjoy such luxuries.

They are in effect small businesses. They get a one-off payment each year to cover all costs from researchers to office hardware, envelopes to teabags. They usually get one telephone line, so they can't have both a fax machine and a modem. Local research and constituency offices need to be connected, websites built and maintained, constituents' e-mails answered and endless internal policy documents left unread in the inbox.

They do get help with this set-up: they have the grandly titled Parliamentary Data and Video Network. This is the central network providing e-mail, internet access and the parliamentary intranet. Yet fewer than half of MPs use it. Why? The busy schedules are one explanation, but many MPs resist any technology more recent than papyrus.

And the network itself doesn't help. It is supposed to link every device MPs buy, but there is no standard for purchasing. This means that some poor soul working on the parliamentary network has the Sisyphean task of making all computers talk to each other and support them when they go wrong. Given that many computer companies have yet to learn how to make their computers communicate properly, this is a big task.

Then there are access issues. The government is determined to create access for all. So let's start with those who really need it: the researchers and assistants outside parliament in local constituencies. According to Alun Michael MP: "At the moment, staff in constituency offices can't do stuff as well as in the house. That's crackers. I can't even update my Palm from constituency or home, only within the parliamentary estate."

He should know. He was instrumental in making sure the Welsh Assembly bypassed some of these problems. "The parliamentary network is incredibly helpful in terms of support, but we ought to follow the model for the Welsh Assembly where we gave a high standard of equipment to every member and they worked consistently. All assembly members are streets ahead of what you see normally in the Commons."

With no consistent standards, MPs' websites, where they exist, are not surprisingly a mixed bag. They range from the excellent (Vincent Cable) through the sleek (Michael Portillo) to the frankly twee (Anne Widdecombe).

With all these problems, it is remarkable that MPs have got so far. At this rate, instead of leading us into the digital age, they will be the last group in the country to enter it. Only a few - Michael Fabricant, Charles Allen and Alun Michael, for example - show signs that they can move into the new era.

How can we expect MPs to vote on new technology bills when their own awareness of e-technology is so low? The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act, passed in November 2000, is a perfect example. It allows some UK authorities to intercept internet communications and seize protected stores of computer data and traffic. It is not just criminal activity that is affected. Only legislators who don't use e-mail and barely understand how new technology operates could propose something so unworkable.

What is the solution? Give them more money. If we want our parliament to work more effectively, we need to provide the funds. All MPs should have a single set of hardware, software and net technology that they are obliged to use centrally and locally.

Then they would be obliged to participate in a new form of electronic democracy, where constituents and MPs would have mutually efficient access to each other.

Just before the election, the Senior Salaries Review Body proposed centralised procurement for MPs' offices. This proposal has not yet been acted on. Strange, then, that another part of the report, which recommended pay rises for ministers, appears not to have run into such problems. Perhaps ministers needed the funds quickly to buy some new PCs.

Mike Bracken (mike@mikebracken.com) is vice-president of interactive products at UPC Media and moderated the judging panel for this year's award

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