How Can We Best Involve You?

There was a lot of talk during the last election about giving more power to you. All the main parties shared a desire to involve citizens more in decision-making, planning and delivering services.  At the London Borough of Bexley, we have had this ambition for a long time.

Joining with izwe, we now have a new tool, BexleyTalks, to allow us to collect your views, opinions and ideas.  But we are faced with a challenge: to discover the best and most effective ways of getting you involved.  So we thought, as a start, we'd ask you.

We'd ask you: In the work that we do as your local authority, how would you like to be involved?  Let's work out together how to work things out together.

When it comes to the opportunities that new technology offers, this is still a young field, and everyone is getting used to it.  It’s great we can now vote instantly online, browse through videos, read instant opinions and views without even leaving our homes, let alone turning up to a council meeting.

There are challenges as well – for instance, in this online community space, will people just 'turn up to bash', or will we get some really constructive comments and great ideas? That one is largely up to you.  Will you create a welcoming environment for others or an unpleasant one? We've got community guidelines which we are asking people to stick to, and we will be moderating – but it is all common sense.  We want this to be a place the whole community feels welcome in, and are confident to give their views. 

So: what to do now?

Sign up to izwe! If you've not done so already.  Make friends and remember to 'join' Bexley and our Conversation! (click the red 'join' button)

Take our survey “Are you involved enough?” here

Feedback on some current 'Have your say' type activites here

Suggest a way you can be involved (click here) in a service or policy area in our 'call for ideas'

See different ways you can be involved already through our regular 'have your say on...' blog posts, where we'll be looking at how you can get involved in various service areas.

Take part in or start discussions about 'public engagement' in our forum here

Help us build this community: invite your friends to join in or share the content here on facebook or twitter

So we hope there's enough to keep you occupied and get some constructive conversation going.  If you've got feedback or comments on this conversation, have ideas or suggestions for other things you want to see on here, email mark.corbin@izwe.com (or raise it in the forum!)