Voters can now Twitter their MPs

Twitter hopes to foster open conversations with MPs

A new service aims to help MPs better interact with their constituencies through the Twitter social networking tool.

TweetMinster hopes to foster real-time open conversations in order to make politicians more accountable and give the British public a chance to make their opinions heard in decisions that shape political life in the UK.

Twitter lets users share thoughts and current activities with friends, family and anyone else who chooses to 'follow' them.

The service has garnered millions of users, including high-profile celebrities such as Stephen Fry who has over 22,000 followers and created a huge stir when he criticised the BlackBerry Storm and Windows Vista using Twitter.

TweetMinster allows voters to connect with their MPs, filter posts by activity, party and constituency, and streams all the latest posts made by MPs on Twitter. It also allows constituents to email their MPs and invite them to use Twitter if they are not already signed up.

The service was inspired by a conversation on Twitter with an MP, and is a collaboration between UnLtdWorld, an online platform for social entrepreneurs, and creative agency Thin Martian.

"Following a post on Twitter by Tom Watson MP I discovered Tweet Congress, a service that connects voters and Congress in the US," said Alberto Nardelli, chief executive at UnLtdWorld.

"I was inspired by it, and thought that it would be a wicked idea to have something similar in the UK. Ultimately the goal is to improve communications between parliament and people, as we feel that more transparent conversations will mean better government."

In the future the developers have said they will release the data and allow third parties to use it on their own websites, social network pages and applications. It is also planning new features to build awareness and debates around key issues and parliamentary voting.

"Ever since working on the election-winning 1997 New Labour web site I've been inspired by the digital democracy movement and the power of the web to give us a louder voice in the decisions that shape their lives," said Andrew Walker, creative director at Thin Martian.

"Twitter, Facebook and web sites like that represent a political watershed. It's an opportunity for politicians to reach the public and for the public to connect with politicians like never before."