Clampdown on online abuse of council staff

NEW rules have been put in place by Dumfries and Galloway Council to protect staff from online abuse.

It follows instances where some employees were named and vilified on the official Facebook page.

Now social media ‘house rules’ have been strengthened to prevent nasty attacks on X (Twitter) and YouTube too.

A report has been drawn up on the matter, titled Responding to Abuse of Council Colleagues (Zero Tolerance Approach).

It says: “Social media is a valuable tool for council engagement with the community, but it has also been a platform where some individuals direct inappropriate comments at the council or even at named staff.

“The house rules on our website – which outline what is acceptable on our official Facebook, X (Twitter), and other channels – were updated in July to explicitly include that harassing or abusive comments towards staff will be removed and the user may be blocked. The update made it clear that personal attacks on staff are not allowed.”

In addition, if a comment is posted that attacks or abuses a council employee by name, that user is banned, while more general abusive comments are deleted or hidden.

In addition, comments are turned off on some posts which are expected to attract abuse or off-topic comments. However, this is used sparingly on Facebook as officials insist “the default is open public discourse”, but are permanently turned off on the council’s YouTube channel, which broadcasts live council meetings.

The council report added: “These measures have been effective in reducing the visibility of abuse.

“The vast majority of public interactions on our social channels remain civil and constructive.”