But we don't live in an ideal world. People are ignorant and selfish. Councils are cash-strapped. So, once in a while, I'll go litter picking. I strap on a high-vis jacket, take a grabber, gloves, and refuse sack. Then I get to work. It feels like the least I can do. I want to live in a pleasant environment and spending a few hours in the muck is a small effort which gives meaningful change.

That's also how I feel about most online activity I do.

I recently took part in Democracy Club's General Election Data Gathering exercise. A bunch of us went through all the election documents published showing who was standing. We (semi) manually transcribed documents, checked they were accurate, added details about candidates, and generally gave the data a good scrubbing.

I made over 200 contributions⁰.

In an ideal world, the local authorities would publish all these data in a standardised format, with appropriate metadata, and digitally authenticate the documents. But councils are cash-strapped and many of the people involved come from a paper-based world with little thought for digital technologies. Despite repeated efforts¹, local authorities seem reluctant to engage in the data-driven world.

I want to live in a world where every voter can quickly and easily find out who they can vote for - and where they can vote². So I engage in digital litter picking.

It isn't glamorous or sophisticated work. It doesn't require much training, or a huge time commitment. But it's the sort of thing that I think can make a real difference to the civic environment.

If you've ever corrected a typo in an Open Source readme, or added alt-text to an image, or tidied up some broken references in Wikipedia - you're doing Digital Litter Picking. You're cleaning up after others. And I think that's a marvellous way to spend a little time.

Sometimes these questions are sensible and journalistic. Sometimes they're vexatious. Sometimes they're a little silly.

The silly ones can be fun to answer. It's a good chance for a politician to show their human side. It's pretty hard to get wrong. I mean, unless the question is "What's the Minister's favourite pop song?" and they answer "I'm the Leader of the Gang by Garry Glitter".

Someone has send an FoI request asking:

Please, could you tell me the chancellor's preferred brand and type of biscuit?

Ah! That's a brilliant question. An absolute home-run for any politician. Unless, to mix your metaphors, you score an own goal.

The official response says:

We can confirm that the Rt Hon Jeremy Hunt MP, Chancellor of the Exchequer, has a preference for Jaffa Cakes

This is despicable!

The UK's tax revenue office, HMRC, fought McVities (manufacturer of Jaffa Cakes) at a VAT tribunal in 1991. The crux of the case was this: chocolate covered biscuits attract VAT, chocolate covered cakes do not. Are Jaffa Cakes biscuits?

The answer?

The leading case on the borderline is that concerning Jaffa cakes: United Biscuits (LON/91/0160). Customs and Excise had accepted since the start of VAT that Jaffa cakes were zero-rated as cakes, but always had misgivings about whether this was correct. Following a review, the department reversed its view of the liability. Jaffa cakes were then ruled to be biscuits partly covered in chocolate and standard-rated: United Biscuits (as McVities, one of the largest manufacturers of Jaffa cakes) appealed against this decision.

Taking all these factors into account, Jaffa cakes had characteristics of both cakes and biscuits, but the tribunal thought they had enough characteristics of cakes to be accepted as such, and they were therefore zero-rated.

VFOOD6260 - Excepted items: Confectionery: The bounds of confectionery, sweets, chocolates, chocolate biscuits, cakes and biscuits: The borderline between cakes and biscuits

Jaffa Cakes are not biscuits. The law says so!

Now, Hunt isn't the first politician to make this mistake - First Minister of Scotland Nicola Sturgeon also made the same dubious claim. But, unlike Hunt, she presumably wasn't steeped in the day-to-day minutiae of tax affairs.

There's a serious point to my ramblings. It's always easy to give an off-the-cuff answer to a trivial question. But there'll always be some know-it-all who treats a lack of precision as evidence of a deep moral or intellectual failing. This is the reason why public figures are (usually) so guarded about their answers and have everything triple checked by professionals. It's easy for a slip of the tongue or a colloquialism to be aggressively misinterpreted.

Just as I am doing here.

But there are no regulations on political advertising.

There are dozens of smaller parties contesting the UK's General Election. Some are single issue parties, some are independents, some parties contest multiple seats, some contest only one.

Some parties are funded by individuals - some by companies.

Here's a thought experiment. What would stop the Red Apple Cigarette Company forming the "Legalise Tobacco Party"?

Their (hypothetical) platform is to allow smoking in public, lower the age of tobacco consumption to 14, remove taxes on cigarettes, and the resumption of tobacco advertising.

Single issue parties, which have the sole aim of decriminalising various narcotics, are a long-standing feature of British politics. The LTP just focusses on tobacco.

The UK's Electoral Commission has some rules for the registration of political parties. They're mostly around making sure names and logos aren't too similar to existing parties. There's also various rules around funding and other bureaucratic stuff.

If our theoretical Legalise Tobacco Party wished to contest every seat in the UK, they could spend about £34 million on advertising. They could run adverts in the press, on billboards, social media, and even - possibly - party political broadcasts on TV. All with a simple message:

Smoking is cool!

Vote for us to reduce the price of delicious Red Apple Cigarettes. Vote for the smoother tobacco - preferred by doctors - and suitable for children! We're the only cigarette with pep! And your vote guarantees that you'll look extra sexy while puffing on our brand. Vote for freedom! Vote for smoking!

Political adverts aren't regulated. The political party can make whatever claims they like, right?

As far as I can see - and I am neither a political scientist nor legal scholar - there's very little to stop a sufficiently determined company (or group of companies) from forming a political party. And there's not much that can be done about a political party making dodgy claims.

They might not get many votes, and it might cause enormous backlash to their brand, and I dare say the law would tighten after a stunt like this. But what would stop a group of mad billionaires from funding a political party in order to circumvent advertising restrictions?

One of the weird things about working in Westminster is how terrifyingly normal it becomes to work in grand old buildings, stuffed with grand old artworks, and staffed with grand old politicians. You turn a corner and there's a bit of Henry VIII's tennis court. There's a Tracy Emin hanging on the wall. That's the table where that peace treaty was signed. For goodness sake - don't sit on that chair!

Every time you open a cupboard door, you're confronted with a little bit of history.

While working in one building (I'm far too modest to say which) I was sent to grab a few extra chairs from a store-room. Oh, it is all glamour, let me tell you!

In amongst all the trestle-tables, old coffee urns, and discarded filing cabinets, was this:

Zoinks! The infamous Jenga Podium for erstwhile PM Truss.

Naturally, the only thing to do when you meet a celebrity is snap a selfie with them 😆

I've scrubbed the EXIF metadata so as not to reveal its top secret location.

This post is a little silly, but contains a serious message. Everything is kept. Short of deliberate destruction, every decision - good or bad - is recorded somewhere. Sure, the Post-It Notes might fall off, and the Zoom call wasn't recorded, but the consequences of those decisions linger on.

It's all there. Just waiting for an eager - or lost - Civil Servant to literally open the door.

The day the EU referendum was announced, the then Prime Minister came to visit our office. We were given a chance to talk to him in front of TV cameras.

This was my chance. I could ask a question - the perfect question - which would win the referendum and bring down the government. I spent the morning practising what I would say. I psyched myself up, and positioned myself in the PM's eyeline.

Of course, I wasn't called. And, of course, my question wasn't that great. The PM would have smoothly brushed me off. Or, maybe, I'd have had five minutes of fame on the local news. Or, more likely, I'd be fired.

Tomorrow, I have a call with the current Prime Minister. I expect it will be listen-in only with no chance of questions. But what if it isn't? I have fantasies of asking the question. The one which makes a madman reconsider his wicked life and repent. My mind is stewing. Could I craft such a question and get through to him? The one which trained journalists have so far failed to land.

No. Obviously not. At best, he would make a joke and move on. At worst, I'd irreparably damage my career - and sabotage the project I've worked so hard for.

The joy of capitalism means that I need to be employed to survive.

But.

Shouldn't I at least try? What's the point of being in the room if you can't speak truth to power? What's the point of promising to give professional, impartial advice, if that advice is curtailed by fear?

I'm not a super-senior Civil Servant. I'm a tiny pawn. He doesn't know me and my words carry no weight. My sacrifice means nothing.

Morally, I know that speaking out is the right thing to do. But can I find the words which protect myself and my team at the same time as speaking truth to power? I'll spend the night tossing and turning, trying to find the right words. Trying to find any words at all.

The next afternoon They didn't allow any questions.

It's the evening of the 2019 General Election. I am plagued by two thoughts.

Briefly stated, the Gell-Mann Amnesia effect works as follows.

You open the newspaper to an article on some subject you know well. You read the article and see the journalist has absolutely no understanding of either the facts or the issues. Often, the article is so wrong it actually presents the story backward-reversing cause and effect. You read with exasperation or amusement the multiple errors in a story-and then turn the page to national or international affairs, and read with renewed interest as if the rest of the newspaper was somehow more accurate about far-off Palestine than it was about the story you just read.

You turn the page, and forget what you know.

And

The pre-election period (purdah) is the term used to describe the period between the time an election is announced and the date the election is held. Civil servants are given official guidance by the Cabinet Office on the rules they must follow in relation to Government business during this time.

People tweet wrong things all the time. But, during this election, I've seen people I admire and respect tweeting out things I know to be false.

I don't mean slightly wrong about an esoteric policy. I mean balls-to-the-wall, head-up-the-arse, foot-in-mouth, inexcusably wrong.

I get that part of politics is enraging people to gather them to your cause. But these were people who I eagerly followed so that I could understand what was going on in an increasingly complicated world.

In normal circumstances, I'd've argued with them online. Sure, it's neither healthy nor a good way to change people's minds - but it would be something.

Purdah - a somewhat politically-incorrect term - prevents Civil Servants from commenting on things during the election. It's a sensible policy - but a bit annoying when People Are Wrong On The Internet. In fairness, I probably shouldn't get involved in arguments - that's best left to the press team.

But I am conflicted. I have first-hand, expert knowledge about a subject. I can objectively prove my arguments. Why shouldn't I be able to correct people's mistakes?

Even worse - and the thing that mildly terrifies me - if my idols are wrong about that thing, what else are they wrong about?