In advance of the debate in Westminster Hall on 1 July looking at the question of second jobs for MPs the House of Commons Library has produced a comprehensive briefing document. It covers the current situation and Code of Conduct, the historical position, and the work of the Committee on Standards in Public Life
You can read it here: https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-10055
Thinking about a job in politics?
Aged between 18 and 24?
Come and develop your skills for future involvement in public service and campaigns.
The two day bootcamp will run on Thursday 16 and Friday 17 July. The first day will be held in Westminster and the second in Leighton Buzzard.
To apply, please fill in this application form by Friday 12th June
The House of Commons Library and w4mp have published two new guides to casework to help you and your office handle questions, casework and conversations with constituents.
Find out what MPs offices can and can’t help with, explore casework resources, get information for constituents and discover how to navigate the grey areas.
You can find the Library Guide on their website, with further resources on Parlinet including a link to the w4mp guide.
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We’re coming up to the announcement of the 2026 Parliament’s People Awards, which recognise the inspirational teams and individuals who have impressed and shown dedication and commitment to supporting a thriving parliamentary democracy.
Anybody working for the House of Commons, House of Lords, the Parliamentary Digital Service, or in a constituency office can nominate a colleague who they believe has gone above and beyond in their work to enable UK democracy, and this year’s shortlist of nominations has now been published.
Here at w4mp we are really pleased to see that our own Karen Lawrinson, the mainstay of this site, maintainer of the hotlist, and all-round wonderful colleague has been shortlisted for the Parliamentary In-House Individual of the Year award, not just for the amazing work she does here but for her many other contributions she makes. As the nomination says, “Karen’s work directly improves the resilience, effectiveness, and cohesion of parliamentary teams, enabling staff across the UK to perform their roles with confidence and efficiency.”
It’s Parliament Week – see https://www.ukparliamentweek.org/en/ – and lots of activities will be taking place across the country. Parliament Week (UKPW) is an annual event, spreading the word about what Parliament is, what it does and how you can get involved and featured over 10,000 activities last year.
You may have heard from people running events with invitations for local MPs to attend.
Dissolution is the official term for the end of a Parliament before a general election. When Parliament is dissolved every seat in the House of Commons becomes vacant. MPs immediately revert to being members of the general public and those who wish to become MPs again must stand for election as candidates.
The House has now published its revised dissolution guidance, which aims to help Members and Members’ staff understand the rules in place and the support available to them before, during and after the next election, including what to expect during the dissolution period.
You can find the guidance on the new parliamentary intranet, ParliNet, and we have published our own page on w4mp to track the guidance.
Please note that the guides etc may be updated before the election and so you should refer to ParliNet and not any stored web pages or PDFs for the latest guidance.
Are you a parliamentary worker who uses evidence-based information as part of your role? A new research project supported by the Chartered Institute of Public Relations is asking what sources of information you use and why. The aim of the work is to understand how evidence could be communicated to policy makers more effectively. Take part in a short online survey and you could win £100 for yourself or for charity. For more information and to take part, go to this link:
https://oxford.onlinesurveys.ac.uk/communicating-evidence-to-policy-makers-what-works-best
The request to post came from Dr Caroline Wood at Oxford University, who has been awarded a grant from the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) to investigate which sources of information policy makers most rely on to access current evidence on topical issues.
The aim is that the findings of this will inform a publicly-accessible ‘best practice guide’ for all those whose role involves communicating evidence to policy makers (including thinktanks, research institutions, universities, and NGOs). By understanding which information sources are favoured by policy makers, this will allow organisations with limited resources for policy engagement to focus on the channels that are most likely to be effective.
The core activity of the project is a short online survey which asks policy makers (including policy advisers and research assistants for MPs) which sources of evidence they use and why.
They are looking for as many participants as possible in order to generate enough data to glean some valuable insights and we are happy to bring it to the attention of our readers
We have just published two short guides about ways to make your documents look better, on screen and in print. They are both available here or from the Guides menu.
The Balfour Project intends to appoint fifteen Balfour Project Peace Advocacy Fellows for the academic year 2022-23. If you are a postgraduate or final year undergraduate student with an interest in Israel-Palestine, you are welcome to apply.
The selected fellows will be paid a bursary of £700 payable in two tranches at the midpoint and end of the academic year.
As a fellow, you will be given the opportunity to make a tangible contribution to the work of the Balfour Project by campaigning for peace within your academic institution and more generally,
Applications for the 2022/23 Fellowship are now open.
To find out more about the content and expectations for the 2022/23 Fellowship programme, please read our Call for Fellows.
If you would like to make an application, please click here to fill out and submit an application form.
Applications for the 2022/23 Fellowship close on Friday 16th September 5 pm UK time. After which, the Fellowship coordination team will review applications and be in touch.
Please contact fellowship@balfourproject.org should you have any questions.