Blair gears up for e-lection

The campaign teams of all of the UK's political parties are geared up and ready to fight for crucial floating voters using the internet for the first time in a major way during a general election.

"The internet is becoming increasingly important," said a Labour Party spokesman, "but it always takes a bit of time for any new technology to have an impact."

The revamped site (http://www.labour.org.uk ) includes an online map of Britain which voters can use to find out how Labour has helped their local area.

The disappointing results of new media campaigning in the US presidential election last year have led some party strategists to play down the significance of the web, but Conservative chief internet planner, Jonathan French, has no doubt of its value.

"The internet and email are an extremely important medium of communication in today's modern world," he told silicon.com. "We're very keen to avoid the sort of classic 'political' website style like the Labour Party, based on invective against your opponents and boring press releases in a boring press release style."

But the Conservatives have already run into controversy over a viral email campaign based on their 'Keep the Pound' crusade. Over 20,000 messages with the subject 'message from Labour' were sent out to voters who, according to French, had willingly given the party their email addresses after signing their Keep the Pound petition.

But Labour claims it received a series of complaints from users who mistakenly thought they were being spammed by Labour. "We contacted people who felt they had been spammed and told them to direct their complaints to the Conservative Party instead," said Labour's spokesman.

The problems are unlikely to discourage campaign teams who plan to use the internet to its full extent. "When we get closer to the election we have planned new innovations which take our ideas to the next stage," French promised.

Stay logged on to silicon.com during the election for all the latest campaign stories, statistics on which party is most successfully using the web and how to make your vote work best for the internet community.