Julian Lewis MP urged by petition to accept constituents' emails
AN online petition has been launched to persuade New Forest East MP Julian Lewis to accept constituents’ emails after his rejection of the technology made national headlines this week.
Julian Lewis is the only one of the UK’s 650 MPs to insist on residents communicating with him by either visiting his office in person or phoning, faxing or writing by post. He maintains emails are insecure and that making it too easy for people to get in touch would swamp his office.
But he has been taken on by professional photographer Catherine Ovenden (36), whose cause was first highlighted in the ‘A&T’ last week and has now accused him of “obstructing democracy”.
Her campaign was later picked up by newspapers including the Daily Mail, The Sun and The Guardian, and even discussed by John Humphrys on the Today programme on BBC Radio 4.
She was inspired to act after unsuccessfully trying to contact the long-serving Conservative MP the day before a debate that she wanted him to take part in on her behalf.
“The whole reason I wanted to email him was about a mental health debate which I only found out about the night before it was due to take place. I wanted to email him and ask him to attend,” she explained.
“But I couldn’t email him so I could not get my message to him in time. It’s really important, because other MPs use email and even Twitter and social media to help them represent their constituents properly.
“I would like other residents to sign the petition and make our voice heard. If he does not listen then it’s obstructing democracy.”
She added: “I was very surprised when I saw the headlines, but very pleased. I hope he reads it and changes his mind so his constituents can contact him more easily.”
Mrs Ovenden has now stepped up her campaign by launching an online petition on the official gov.uk website asking that all MPs use email and Twitter to allow their constituents to contact them. It is currently being officially verified before being opened to the public.
Under the rules, if more than 10,000 people sign then the government will respond. If it breaks the 100,000 barrier, MPs are obliged to consider the issue for debate.
To make a point, Mrs Ovenden also sent to the MP, who is chairman of the Defence Select Committee, a handwritten letter wax-sealed with a butterfly stamp.
“The colour purple represents dignity and it was used by the suffragettes,” she explained. “I used the butterfly because it represents change.”
As revealed in the ‘A&T’, Julian Lewis is the only MP who cannot be contacted through the charity website Write to Them, which since 2004 has acted as a go-between to make parliamentarians more accessible and accountable to the public.
It recently closed as a line of communication to Dr Lewis when the group’s fax machine broke and it emerged he was the only MP who was having contact requests via the website sent on by fax, so the machine was not replaced.
A spokesperson for Dr Lewis’s office told the ‘A&T’ on Wednesday: “Julian has said all he is going to say and that’s it.”
Last week they said there had been a “tiny number of complaints” about the email issue over the years, but people were free to contact Dr Lewis by phone, fax and letter, or arrange a face-to-face meeting at his regular surgeries.
Dr Lewis, who is the chairman of the Commons Defence Select Committee, has said in the past he believes email “slows down and sometimes paralyses the efficient conduct of office work”.
The increasing use of email to contact MPs was highlighted last year when the Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow MP, published the findings of his Commission on Digital Democracy.
It concluded: “This is good because it means that more people are engaging with their MP, but it also makes it more difficult for MPs to respond to their constituents on a personal level.”
It reported one MP who claimed to receive around 600 emails each working day, and warned there was a growing risk that the “the quiet individual messages that need particular help” could be missed.
