Best open government service, sponsored by Microsoft

MP Playing Cards iPad App by Southgate Labs

Description and content sources

MP Playing Cards iPad App (http://www.southgatelabs.com/playingcards/)

This mash-up is a light-hearted iPad app with an underlying web service, combining statistical data about the current Members of Parliament from a number of different sources, from Hansard to Twitter.

Many of us grew up collecting All Blacks playing cards out of Weetbix packets, and then comparing their vital, but ultimately meaningless, statistics with our friends to see which player was the best. For some reason, there has never been an edition for MPs. Well, now there is!

It's simple to play. Select two MPs and find out the winner. You can play by yourself, or with a friend, by each choosing one MP. The application uses a complex formula to determine the winning MP. Preference is given to members who are active on Twitter, those who don't spend too much and who don't cause trouble in the debating chamber - the application awards yellow cards to Members who raise points of order and red cards to those who have been asked to leave. The results will even show you the Members most frequently used words from speeches.

Underneath this silliness there is a serious question: how should we measure the performance of our elected representatives? The media often seems to encourage focus on travel and accommodation spending, public outbursts and controversy, and other such measures. This mash-up takes that sensationalist approach to the extreme. But is there another approach that might yield better results?

The data used in this app comes from public Twitter profiles and from the New Zealand Parliament website.

In particular, for data on the current Parliament, we used the following sources:

Members of Parliament - http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/MPP/MPs/MPs/
Favourite Words, Points of Orders and Withdrawls from Chamber - http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/PB/Debates/Debates/
Expenses - http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/MPP/MPs/Expenses/
Bills - http://www.parliament.nz/en-NZ/PB/Legislation/Bills/

All of this information is available under a Crown Copyright license.

Judges’ comments

This category’s criteria were “encourages transparent, accessible, and accountable government at any level”. MP Playing Cards won for its accessibility: this is a fun and straightforward way to present information about our elected representatives, including their most frequently uttered words, accommodation and travel expenses, and Twitter activity if any.

MP Playing Cards iPad App (http://www.southgatelabs.com/playingcards/)

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  Best open government service

  Awarded to the mashup that best encourages transparent, accessible, and accountable government at any level. A $2000 cash prize will go to the winner of this category.