LGA and Socitm encourage councils to make local election information and results more widely available by joining the Open Election Data Project

The Local Government Association and Socitm, the public sector ICT professionals' body, are lending their support to an initiative designed to get council election information and results more widely published.

The Open Election Data Project has been launched in part as a response to the fact that there is no freely available national database of local election results. Anyone wishing to understand the national picture following the local elections on May 6, will need to compile this information through a laborious manual process involving finding, cutting and pasting information published by the 164 different councils running elections.

The Open Local Election Data Project is encouraging local authorities to publish election results on their websites in a particular way, so that this process of collecting the information for re-use can be automated. As a result, news media, academics, think tanks, politicians, citizens and others will be able to compile their own results database, with minimal effort, and if they wish, analyse the information in different ways, 'mash-it up' with other data, and publish their findings.

Making election data open and re-usable in this way is relatively simple technical task involving the way the code that delivers information through websites is marked up. The Open Election Data Project has developed a guide for council web managers and developers to follow at www.openelectiondata.org

Socitm and the LGA are supporting the project by publishing and promoting a plain English explanation of the benefits of making election data open and signposting the information and support available to councils who want to make this happen. As part of this, Socitm has established the Open Election Data community in the IDeA Communities of Practice, where issues can be shared and problems solved. Councils not holding elections in May are being encouraged to take part in the Project by taking the same steps to publish past election data in open format.

The LGA and Socitm believe that getting involved in the initiative will put councils at the forefront of the new drive for openness and transparency. Election results are just one, topical, example of public data that could be made more readily available for everyone's benefit as a consequence of public authorities committing themselves to doing things just a little differently.

Tim Allen, LGA Group Analysis and Research Programme Director said: "Being able to access other authorities' local elections results, and the ability to combine it with other local information, would offer valuable insights and opportunities for local authorities for both their own working knowledge and communication with residents."

Jos Creese, newly elected President of Socitm and Head of IT at Hampshire County Council  commented: 'The momentum behind the 'open data' movement is gathering, and councils that get involved now, with this elections project, will put themselves at the cutting edge of this movement'.

Lichfield District Council was the first local authority to report that its election data was now 'open'.

Further information

Vicky Sargent
Tel: 07726 601 139
Socitm Press Office  vicky.sargent@socitm.net

LGA Press Office
Tel: 0207 664 3333