Joe Hockey is a Gen-Y TwitterHead! Is that privileged?

James Riley
Thursday, 10 September 2009 16:12

Opinion and Analysis

With shadow treasurer Joe Hockey doing his best to impersonate a Gen-Y TwitterHead during Question Time in the past couple of days – all slouch and no eye contact – its as good a time as any to look at social media policy.

And while there are very specific (and different) rules for what politicians can do – and even more specific rules about what they can do inside the House – it’s a timely reminder that we’re adrift somewhat in a regulatory No Man’s Land as social media invents itself in a public sector/government/political context.

It’s a Watch This Space space. A Gov 2.0 taskforce formed by Lindsay Tanner and (Special Minister of State) Joe Ludwig reports at the end of the year. And the Commonwealth’s chief information officer Ann Steward is working on some fleshy guidelines for the public service also expected by the end of the year.

But first Joe Hockey, who’s been slumped on the Opposition frontbench, fixated for long periods on his Blackberry, tweeting from inside the House chamber.

Aside from the up-to-the-minute, I’m-too-sexy-for-my-shirt, non-verbal Gen-Y rudeness of it, is tweeting during #QT against the rules? And, more interestingly, do Joe’s tweets attract parliamentary privilege?

Well, first to the PM, who had a go at his old mate (tamely-lamely) on the 7.30 Report. He thinks the behaviour is “bizarre” and that Joe should pay attention. (I hate to bring this up Prime Minister, but there have been even more bizarre things happen in the chamber – one infamous episode involving a young KRudd, now immortalised YouTube, that other Gen-Y favourite.)

Sydney Morning Herald political sketch writer Annabel Crabb – who also dishes daily #QT tweets via @CrabbTwitsard – and Joe were on Canberra’s ABC 666 Local Radio earlier today talking about Twitter and Parliament.

Both are big fans of the micro-blogging service. And both didn’t see a particular problem tweeting from the chamber. Certainly labtops, notebooks, PDAs and phones are allowed in the House, so its certainly not against the rules (you can’t make or receive phone calls – but according to Joe this has more to do with the rule about not disturbing the running of the House than the device.)

But whether or not the rules of Parliamentary Privilege apply … that was the question that had Joe Hockey doing a quick mental scan of everything he had sent from the inside the chamber (No problems there).

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