What do you know about your Councillors?

There are 70 Councillors, who represent the residents of 34 Wards in Bristol.

I live in Southville and have never seen either of my current Councillors "in the flesh". I see them mentioned in the local press and have watched them on recordings of Committee Meetings.

I am interested in understanding how Councillors engage with the residents they represent. The main form of engagement seems to be via e-mail, but it is not possible to get any data on how many e-mails are exchanged as this is private.

I have assessed the Councillor usage of different Social Media Platforms like Facebook, X, NextDoor, TikTok and Bluesky.

The challenge is that it is either impossible (or very expensive) to get the usage date from most of these platforms, apart from Bluesky.

Luckily, almost 50% of Councillors use Bluesky.

And this is the Bluesky coverage by Ward.

Why does this matter?

I believe we can only improve engagement between Councillors and the people they represent if we have constructive conversations in the public realm that everyone can see and take part in.

The current Council engagement tools just don't do the job.

Questions and Statements to Committee Meeting

You need to go on a 6 month training course to be able to understand which Committee you need to submit your statement or question to. Very often the answers don't actually answer the question, and submitters can end up feeling frustrated and ignored.

Consultations

Most of the Bristol City Council consultations get very few responses, and the data gathered is always edited into an engagement report that does not provide the level of detail people like me like to see.

Petitions

If they reach certain thresholds then they can be debated, but your Councillor might not be on the Committee to respond.

Councillor Surgeries

There is no list of when these take place, and you need to be able to attend in person.

E Mails

This is probably the most common way of interacting with your Councillor, but they might be giving similar responses to many people and there is no way they can "broadcast" a specific response that might be of interest to many people.

Elections

This opportunity only comes up once every few years, and the Councillor you speak with might not be your Councillor after the election.

The Bluesky Proposal

Why don't Councillors and Residents try engaging on this Social Media Platform?

Many Councillors are already using it, but it appears that very few residents are engaging with their Councillors.

Analysis of the Councillor usage can also give us insights into what they are interested in and passionate about.

For example did you know that Stephen Williams appeared on Politics West this weekend:

Or that Kaz Self is celebrating diversity in the armed forces:

Or that Rob Bryher appears to torture his kids with weird music:

Or that Andrew Varney spends time cleaning up War Memorials:

Or that Serena Ralston has an interest in historic Bristol maps:

Of course we all know that Social Media can be a nasty place sometimes, so if you do choose to engage with your Councillors on Bluesky then please treat them with respect and remember you can always be blocked.

Councillors on Bluesky

These are the Councillors that are most active.

These are the Councillors who follow Councillors from other parties.

These are the Councillors who have the most followers from other parties.

This is when Councillors have posted.

These are the non-councillors who follow Councillors.

I am top of the list as I have had to follow Councillors in order to make sure I am extracting the correct data.

These are the top non-councillors followed by Councillors.

And you can see information about a specific Councillor.

After spending all this time analysing this data I found that neither of my Southville Councillors are on Bluesky. But I hope other people find this useful and interesting.

This is the list of Councillors who are currently active on Bluesky. You can use the list to follow them if you want to.