Second Informal Brexit Liaison Group meeting held
20 December 2016
The second meeting of the Informal Brexit Liaison Group, set up by the House of Lords Liaison Committee, was held on Monday 19 December.
The Group discussed ways in which the House could communicate its Brexit-related activity to both internal and external audiences with Dr Ruth Fox, Director and Head of Research, and Joel Blackwell, Senior Researcher, Hansard Society and Dr Hannah White, Director of Research, Institute for Government. The House of Lords had published 6 Brexit-themed committee reports the previous week, backed by co-ordinated media campaigns. The Group congratulated the House of Lords Head of Press and Media, who noted the significant amount of positive editorial content alongside the straight news reporting and that many commentators placed the individual committee reports in the wider context of the EU Committee's scrutiny of Brexit and correctly described the reports as part of a co-ordinated series. The extent of engagement on social media, particularly Twitter, had also been considerable.
Points made during the discussion included moving away from listing committee reports chronologically on the parliamentary website towards ordering them thematically (eg agriculture, economy), increasing engagement with local and regional media, making website content more forward-looking, flagging up reports in advance and following up previous reports, and working across Committees, where appropriate with the Commons. Once Article 50 is triggered two-way engagement is likely to become increasingly important, and the Group could play a role in mapping out key events and facilitating engagement with wider audiences, including through seminars, greater use of social media, more audiovisual (as opposed to text) content and use of surveys.
The Group plans to meet next on Monday 9 January 2017 from 4-5pm, when it hopes to focus on co-ordination with House of Commons Committee activity, assisted by Hilary Benn MP, Chairman of the House of Commons Exiting the EU Committee.
Further information
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