Ministers are to harness the power of the web to make government better, by using popular consumer websites to dispense tips and gather ideas on how to govern more effectively.

Tom Watson, Cabinet Office minister for transformational government, told the Financial Times he had set up a Whitehall taskforce to look at how to use the internet so that “we can make our own decisions quicker and better”. Mr Watson, who claims to have been Britain’s first blogging MP, expects the taskforce to meet for the first time next week.