In the first part of this series I looked at bringing general news sources and blogs into one place; in the second I looked at social media discussions. This final part looks at how to know what government departments are saying and doing, even if no one is reporting it.
Data and documents provide some of the most useful leads for reporting: they tell you what the government is doing, and what it is being forced to reveal.
It’s important to understand that much of the information revealed by official government websites are the result of scrutiny by opposition politicians and Freedom of Information requests. This is how to find out when they do. Continue reading How to keep track of welfare issues part 3: data and documents