WRITTEN ON May 17th, 2007 BY William Heath AND STORED IN Design: Co-creation, Foundation of Trust, What do we want?

We all know The Guardian, like all papers, has far more content than any of us could ever humanly read. . But it’s also the place you find some terrific contempory expert voices. One such is the piece today by Paul Hodgkin of Patient Opinion. It’s the perfect primer in what Web 2.0 means for public services. His crucial central point, given some of the government’s current plans:

Running Patient Opinion has convinced us that the state or public sector providers themselves are likely to be poor hosts for these conversations. Citizens are likely to instinctively distrust government websites, suspecting them – rightly or wrongly – of spin. They may also be reluctant to give email addresses to a feedback platform owned by the NHS when they may be users of its services in the future. And, of course, health abounds with controversies, be it hospital closures or herceptin rationing.

In our view, the NHS will find it easier to handle such firestorms if they are hosted on a platform that is clearly independent of the main players.

I wouldn’t exactly call Paul a spin doctor – more someone whose desire to do better for patients has led him eventually, almost reluctantly, to accept that the media can help in the task of getting something so large and ambitious as NHS patient feedback done in the right way. * And I didnt mean to be mean about The Guardian. I just can’t bring myself to express loyalty for any newspaper. I suppose it’s Britain’s second-least-bad. Cheers Malcolm!

**In fact, I softened this post somewhat, in an unexpected wave of good vibes about The Guardian caused not just by reflecting on how beyond the pale the Daily Hate-Mail is.