There are quite a few local newsblogs and political blogs around now that worth a look.
In the blue corner, there’s Steve Horgan, who is a Conservative Councillor in Basildon. Most of his stuff these day seems to be on national politics , and he writes something a few times every month.
In the red corner, there’s Castle Point Labour chap Julian Ware-Lane . His blog is a mixture of local and national stuff, updated nearly every day.
In the golden-yellow corner, there’s Chelmsford Liberal Democrat Stephen Robinson.. His “Chelmsford Chatter” is only updated once in a while, but also has links to Facebook and Twitter.
And in another corner, there’s Resident’s Councillor John Mason from Hawkwell. He writes just about exclusively on local stuff, especially on Hawkwell.
Meanwhile Rochford District Council has now put it’s council newspaper “Rochford District Matters” online, and will be updating it fairly often. There’s a facility for leaving comments, but nobody seems to have left one yet!
There are also a couple of newsblogs around now, one for Canvey and one for Southend. The Canvey one is called “The Canvey Beat”, and is edited by a chap called Ted Pugh. There is some punchy local stuff there. However it seems to be mostly filled with national stories – or even stuff about Berlin Brothels.
At the other extreme is a Southend blog called CouncilBust , which shows a picture of a monk and describes itself as “Independent reporting on governance and representation in Southend”. This seems to be a serious attempt at providing more coverage of local politics in Southend and it will be interesting to see how it develops.