Why do you bother, Sheryll?

A few days ago I posted a list of politicians in Cornwall who 'use' Twitter. Andrew Wallis, rising star of Cornwall Council's Independent fringe, correctly pointed out to me that that the word 'use' was probably not the right choice given that many on the list have 'tweeted' only once or twice since they opened their accounts. I can accept that some will set up a 'presence' on social networking sites only to find out that it's not really their thing, and that I shouldn't be overly judgmental about their non-appearance on Twitter. I suppose they're the people who dabbled but didn't inhale. Fair enough. The ones who trouble me are those who see Twitter simply as a means to broadcast their message rather than offer it up for discussion. These people are amongst us, but they don't care to engage.

I'm thinking in particular of the lovely Sheryll Murray, self-styled Fisherman's Friend and Conservative PPC for South East Cornwall. A while back there was a bit of to-ing and fro-ing on Twitter about Cornwall Council's plans for fortnightly rubbish collections (I had a mini-rant about it here). The Tory/Indie administration at County Hall quickly and ingloriously backed away from the proposals and Sheryll leapt into the fray by tweeting a typically strident put down to their accusers.

Being an enquiring sort (and suspecting the burying of an uncomfortable issue in the run-up to the General Election) I asked her if that meant that fortnightly collections had been completely ruled out. Radio silence followed. So I asked again. And again. Still nothing. Earlier today she posted something vacuous about a letter from David Cameron so I tried one more time:

And still she plays surprisingly hard to get.

I'm actually almost past caring about the bloody dustbins, to tell you the truth, but I must admit to being pretty irked about being ignored by someone who wants to be my Member of Parliament. Maybe she doesn't know how to read her replies column or maybe she doesn't bother because she simply isn't interested in another point of view. I don't know. So I'm going to tweet her a link to this post to see if I can catch her eye.

If you've made it this far Sheryll, below is the 'Comments' link. Feel free to use it. I'll publish whatever you write without amendment. Please use it to tell me why you bother with Twitter. And while you're at it, could you answer my question please?