Link: More than 2,600 SMS for Samy over two days.
Works Minister Datuk Seri S. Samy Vellu received more than 2,600 SMS over the past two days but only 200 of them were related to complaints against his ministry.
Most of the SMS congratulated him.
Works Minister Samy Vellu in Kuala Lumpur setup a complaints bureau recently to enable the public to make a complaint directly via text. More details in the above linked article from The Star Online.
Samy Vellu said he had also received numerous calls from people who were surprised to speak to a minister himself.
Talk about actually connecting with the public!
Samy Vellu said three officers would be working round the clock to handle the complaints.
That is what I want to hear. Obviously it’s only the military that work out of office hours here in the UK 😉
I and my colleague Hetty have routinely sat in front of the United Kingdom’s finest political minds and pitched this concept. We first did it 2 years ago. Then a year ago. Then last month. No dice.
I think the best we, as a population, have ever had is New Labour’s "Big Conversation" (which charged you 25p + the cost of a normal text message to send your opinion in), and I think I recall Simon Hughes doing a ‘text me’ campaign during the last London Mayoral contest.
Why not offer a Home Office text enquiry line?
Why not give each MP their own dedicated text line? 100 million texts sent a day in the UK and SMS is nowhere to be seen in politics.
Why can’t I text the ‘Government’ and ask them how I get my passport updated? Or where I can get a form for a reissue of my driving license? If I can get this information from 82ASK, why can’t I get it from a 24-hour text line operated by ‘The Government’?
Better still, why doesn’t the Government contract 82ASK to supply the service?
Think of all the positive PR stories it would generate. It’d be a goldmine. Whenever a screw-up is about to hit the press, phone up 82ASK-the-Government and get some heart-warming ‘we’re listening and doing’ stories out to the press pronto.