As reported previously, Andy Burnham’s website was hopeless: no-style over no-substance. So we were pleased when we heard the site had gone fully live and was now populated.

Unbelievably, the site has got worse. Honestly. Gone is the two-tone picture of him looking like Kraftwerk, and in its place his flagship leadership campaign, Save the Future Jobs Fund. A worthwhile campaign which includes a petition. A petition that publishes its signatories online. A petition that lets you choose not to join his mailing list, and publishes this online too. A petition that is signed by twenty people. Which is published online.

We’re all for transparency but come on Team Burnham, you’re making your boy look silly. The Milibands have armies of bright young things, gaggles of them, chanting and tweeting and strategising. They’ve got pictures, they’ve got videos, they’re on twitter, they’re on flickr, and they’re on facebook. Even Ed Balls, who only launched his website last week, has done a better job than Burnham, although the Coronation Street themed banner is a little dodge. Diane Abbott’s website is yet to be populated with any real content – and it’s still better than Burnham’s.

In fairness to Andy, he probably had the best choreographed leadership launch, which was far more impressive than the hasty declarations of the Eds and David. And we mustn’t forget that he has managed to garner the support of England’s third fourth best centre-back, Jamie Carragher.

But the question remains, if a team of young Labour activists can build an excellent spoof site in a week, why on earth can’t a leadership candidate build a real one in a month?

But it’s not just the leadership candidates who are struggling with the internet. Many MPs rushed to the web in the run up to the election, ignoring Tom Harris’ very sensible rules, and pressed SEND. Of course we’ve all heard about those who went too far, but what about those who didn’t offend pensioners, but just didn’t quite get it?

Take everyone’s second favourite historian, Tristram Hunt, the MP for Stoke Central, who writes his tweets in the 3^rd person. We are giving him the benefit of the doubt and assuming that this is a misunderstanding of the medium, rather than of his place in the world.

Under orders, back benchers across the country ‘engaged’ with constituents online in the run up to the election, only to vanish once safely employed for another five years. Our most-missed is Conservative MP, Gerald Howarth, whose maiden tweet was on 27 January this year. His twitter account was run by his staff and mainly consisted of pictures of Gerald helping the little people. Those snaps of Gerald brightened our day, but alas his last tweet was 12.25pm on 6 May. Gerald, we miss you.

Tags: Abbott, Burnham, Labour leadership, Miliband, Twitter

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