Tories offer £1m prize for best voter website

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The Conservative Party is offering a £1-million taxpayer-funded prize for a website that is successfully able to “harness the wisdom” of voters and deliver a platform for people to come together online, share ideas and “solve common problems”.

According to the party, to be eligible for the £1 million windfall, a site must deliver an effective and available site for the public to post their ideas on, as well as a truly beneficial outcome. It is also worth pointing out that for the prize to be eligible to anyone at all, the Conservatives actually have to win the 2010 general election.

The prize – the biggest offered by a British government in the modern era – would be shared by the team or individual behind the winning platform, and the Tories had some suggestions of their own of the type of thing they were looking for. Ideas included websites that helped to identify and root out wasteful government spending; credit card bills designed in a way that anyone can understand, rated the quality of schools and hospitals; helped make government information clear and simple; and even picked the England squad for the 2010 World Cup.

Jeremy Hunt, the shadow culture secretary, said the prize would only be awarded “if there is a solution”.

“At this time of year, when families and friends are getting together, we're announcing a new idea to help the British people get together to help solve the problems that matter to them. There are currently no technological platforms that enable in-depth online collaboration on the scale required by government – this prize is a good and cost-effective way of getting one,” he added.

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