Plaid are today (Wednesday, August 6th, 2014) launching a pioneering digital platform for the discussion and gathering of ideas that could be included in the party’s manifesto for the National Assembly Elections in 2016.
Plaid Leader, Leanne Wood AM will launch the Million Ideas platform at 1130am on the Plaid Cymru stand (1008-1010) at Eisteddfod Genedlaethol Sir Gâr, Llanelli.
The Million Ideas platform has been especially designed to gather ideas and responses to those ideas through a Plaid Cymru website, following specialist research and a piloting period.
The aim of the project is to establish a new method to foster greater participation in politics, in a creative and social way which allows everyone to offer, debate and discuss ideas. The website is open to all. It will enable people to contribute an idea about an aspect of policy that needs improvement in a range of policy fields, including education, health, the environment, the economy and the Welsh Language.
Good ideas that gain support and that fit with the values and basic principles of Plaid Cymru will be presented to our policy making process, and may therefore appear in the party’s manifesto for 2016. That means anyone’s idea has a chance of becoming part of a programme for government.
Visitors to the Plaid Cymru stand at the National Eisteddfod in Llanelli will have the opportunity to use the platform and share their ideas for improving Wales.
The website was developed in partnership with Cardiff company NativeHQ, who are specialists in digital media, using the UserVoice platform. The UserVoice interface has been translated into Welsh by Plaid Cymru in order to create a bilingual website for the project- and that interface will now be freely available for everyone who wants to develop a digital discussion platform in Welsh.
Launching the Million Ideas project, Party of Wales Leader Leanne Wood AM said:
“There is no doubt that Wales and its peoples are yet to reach our full potential. Our greatest asset are the people and we could do so much more if we could tap into the talent here by talking to each other, pooling and sharing our information and ideas in a national conversation. Everyone should be involved in the conversation about building Wales.
“Plaid Cymru sees the Million Ideas project as a microcosm of the bigger, national project.
“Plaid Cymru is committed to having a million conversations with the people of Wales before the Assembly elections in 2016. Conversations on the doorstep, in town centres, coffee mornings, social events, shows, festivals, in all kinds of meetings and online. It is a process that we intend to use as an opportunity for learning and improving our policies.”
Carl Morris, of NativeHQ who partnered with Plaid Cymru to create the platform said:
“Digital media allow for new kinds of productive discussion between different people – and organisations of all kinds, but only those organisations that are willing to adapt their approaches and methods. This project is not a talking shop – what distinguishes it from other initiatives is the focus on the real world application of the ideas. I’m looking forward to following the journey that the ideas follow from one person’s mind to a discussion on the Million Ideas platform and then, in some cases, beyond.”
