Changing the face of political engagement

The digital age has brought a range of rapidly evolving tools and channels to enable people to better engage with and participate in politics, campaigns and other issues, said Lord Puttnam. ‘The pace of change is an enormous challenge but presents many opportunities for everyone, particularly young people.’

• Speech: Parliament and Young People – bringing the two together in a digital world
• Lord Puttnam's biography
• Lord Speaker's homepage

The talk looked at how technological innovations can change the way the political and parliamentary system interacts with people and encourage greater public engagement with politics.

The Lord Speaker, Baroness Hayman, said it is important for politicians to engage with and listen to the public using the many digital channels available: ‘Parliament itself has embraced a number of social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and blogs, which have dramatically increased our reach to audiences we might not otherwise have contacted through more traditional methods of communication.’

The Lord Speaker’s outreach programme aims to reach out to different groups and communities to encourage their interest in the House of Lords. More than 200 students from schools in London and youth representatives from the Hansard Society and the UK Youth Parliament attended the lecture, and participated in a short Q&A session following Lord Puttnam's talk. 

Further information

• Watch a short film about the event, including vox pops from the audience and speakers, on Parliament’s YouTube channel
• View photographs from the event in the House of Lords outreach collection on Parliament’s Flickr channel
• Watch Lord Puttnam's Robing Room lecture on BBC Democracy Live