And other news from mySociety
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** Explore donations & gifts to MPs
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** September 2024
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The latest Register of Financial Interests has just been published — the first for this Parliament.
That means, if you want to, you can explore gifts and donations given to your own MP (or any other), including during their election campaigns.
To make that easier, we've added the information to MPs' pages on TheyWorkForYou and also provided it in a spreadsheet format — read more here ([link removed]) .
For the even more data-inclined, we've knocked up a quick analysis site that allows you, for example, to see which MPs have property abroad, or which have received donations above a specified amount. Find out about that here ([link removed]) .
** Why are there so few APPGs all of a sudden?
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As well as financial interests, our WhoFundsThem ([link removed]) project will be keeping an eye on APPGs (All Party Parliamentary Groups), so we were initially startled to see that more than 90% of these civil society/Parliament policy groups had disappeared.
On further examination, we think the causes are more admin-based...which, because we're tracking them (and, let's face it, because we're nerds), we still find interesting. Julia explains here ([link removed]) .
TRANSPARENCY HIGHS AND LOWS
** Showcase your FOI accomplishments
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** & win a trip to Madrid
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Have you used Freedom of Information to have a positive impact on society in the last three years — or perhaps you know someone who has?
Our friends Access Info over in Spain have announced a new award. The winner will be invited to Madrid to present their work in front of an international audience at the Open Government Partnership Summit next year. Find out more here ([link removed]) .
Redcar seafront
** FOI is essential at the local level
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When we saw a council criticising Freedom of Information requests as 'burdensome', stating that many requests are from "people looking for business, journalistic requests and other government departments", we had to comment.
Read why FOI at the local authority level is so essential, and why actually, we're all for these types of request, in our LinkedIn article ([link removed]) — or if you prefer your thought pieces in smaller chunks, in this Bluesky thread ([link removed]) .
mySociety websites in a fan-shaped array
** Help us work towards a more resilient, transparent democracy
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At mySociety we're very busy all the time, making democracy more accessible to everyone, and providing the tools to help people play an active part in society.
If you can help us out, please do head to our secure donate page ([link removed]) . Every contribution helps us to work harder and faster towards a better, more inclusive society. Thank you.
** Find us wherever you like to be
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We won't stop blogging, but if you'd like to catch up with mySociety's news in other places:
🔉We have a monthly audio summary ([link removed]) that you can listen to on the website, or subscribe to via your favourite podcast platform - latest edition just out ([link removed]) .
📽️We're making video versions of our blog posts - find them on each post; on TikTok ([link removed]) and Instagram ([link removed]) ; or all together in this YouTube playlist ([link removed]) .
🦋 We're increasingly moving from Twitter to Bluesky ([link removed]) , as we sense many of you are too.
Got thoughts about any of this? Hit 'reply' to this email and let us know.
** What we're reading, watching... and humming
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* More than 55 countries lack Access to Information laws ([link removed]) [Eye on Global Transparency]
* Unfollow everything ([link removed]) : a novel approach to social media from a previous TICTeC speaker [New York Times, paywalled]
* If you think WhoFundsThem is interesting, wait til you see this Danish version ([link removed]) [TikTok]
* We released our strategy as a PDF ([link removed]) , but we're beginning to realise that rapping is a lot more fun ([link removed]) [YouTube]
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