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When I drew fourth place in the ballot for Private Members' Bills I decided that it was an excellent opportunity for wide‐ranging debate on the role and structure of the press in the UK, and for legislation on the press.

To examine the weblogs written by members of UK legislatures and to determine whether such weblogs address commonly cited criticisms of MPs' web sites and serve to bridge the gap between representative and constituent.

Examination of the literature on MPs' web sites to draw up a list of common criticisms. Construction of evaluation criteria to analyse the blogs in terms of content, currency, design, interactivity and evidence of personality both as a snapshot and over a longer period.

That weblogs are, on the whole, kept up to date and show promising levels of activity. Blogs enable constituents to see with what their MPs have been involved (on both the local and the Parliamentary stages) and to see what areas of policy particularly interest their MP. Personality of the MPs is apparent on most of the blogs, which are less party‐oriented than many MPs' web sites. Although the gap between representatives and constituents may have been bridged to an extent, blogging is still largely a top‐down form of communication – even though people do submit relevant and pertinent comments to the blogs, proper two‐way debate is rarely seen and comments are not always acknowledged or answered.

Based on a small number of blogs covering the UK only.

Provides simple evaluation criteria that could be applied to blogs in other areas.

Provides a useful first structured analysis of weblogs written by elected representatives, on which further work can be undertaken once the sample size has increased and existing blogs are more established.

Criticizes government housing finance policy. Condemns refusal to apply controls to the housing market. Argues lack of control has led to high rents and mortgage payments. Outlines the Labour Party′s alternative. Claims this alternative would be fair to owners and tenants. Concludes that a well thought‐out strategy is preferable to free market chaos.

In this paper, the author traces the historical evolution of the use of methods by the police and the executive to undermine the protective effects of the right to silence. He argues that the introduction of greater protections for accused persons in the provisions of the Police and Criminal Evidence Act 1984 has resulted in an increase in costs of the administration of summary jurisdiction with the commensurate reduction in the numbers of persons being convicted. Hence political initiatives are being undertaken to find an effective way to remove the effects of the right to silence, contained in these protections. He examines the effects of the so‐called s. 2 powers to compel answers to questions, possessed by the Serious Fraud Office (SFO). The paper ends by examining the proposals in the recent Report of the Royal Commission on Criminal Justice and argues that the recommendation to extend the exercise of s. 2 powers to the police is merely another step towards the introduction of an increasingly authoritarian regime of criminal justice.

The credibility of journalists and public relations professionals took some bad knocks in 2004. This paper examines the recent history of the debate and some of the efforts being made within the communications industry to rebuild the public confidence that journalism is a vital part of the democratic process. The NUJ has issued new guidelines to its members in public relations at a time when PR professionals are calling for a rethink about the relationship between journalism and PR. The heart of the matter is the issue of trust – which is also high on the post‐Hutton media agenda. Public trust in journalism and in corporate social responsibility is low; “spin” has been disgraced, and media regulation is under reconstruction. How can media professionals forge new relationships with their publics, to promote healthy and open democracy? It is time for dialogue and commitment to work together on redefining the role of all media professionals in an open democracy.

This paper outlines a variety of the research on student attrition and recognises some of the sensitivities that may be involved for some students in dealing with dropping out of university. This paper claims that because of these sensibilities, some student’s responses to direct questions about the reasons for attrition may be biased by social desirability. The purpose of this paper is to get beyond social desirability bias to examine a fuller range of reasons for student retention and attrition.

In an exploratory investigation, this research study uses a projective technique which helps to circumvent the conscious defences of respondents. The projective technique is based on the “thematic apperception test” and uses a “bubble drawing” to elicit emotional and more socially undesirable responses.

All first-year students appear to consider leaving university, and emotional considerations involving loneliness and homesickness are much more prominent than most quantitative studies acknowledge. For example, in this research, social concerns are twice as prominent as financial concerns, whereas in past survey research, financial concerns have been identified as most prominent.

To retain students, universities need to provide new students with real care and support, especially in their first few weeks at university. To study retention comprehensively, researchers need to go beyond the confines of positivist research.

This is the first study that uses a projective technique to investigate student retention and attrition. By going beyond a merely positivist approach to research, a fuller, deeper and more complete understanding of the wide extent and profound nature of the emotional issues involved in student attrition and retention is gained.