§ Mr. OatenTo ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department if he will list the computer games on(a) his Department's website and (b) websites of bodies sponsored by his Department; on what date each was placed on the relevant website; how many times each has been played; and what the cost of producing each game was. [143400]
§ Fiona MactaggartThe Home Office has used games to promote three of its websites.
Backchat and Chatroom Chaos were both used as part of the Child Protection on the Internet campaign to encourage young people to visit www.thinkuknow.co.uk to learn about using the internet safely.
Backchat was launched February 2002 at a cost of £15,000 and has been played 128,853 times. Chatroom Chaos was launched in April 2002 at a cost of £12,000 and has been played 77,905 times.
Kebabathon and Bargain Boost were both used to promote the website www.good2bsecure to students to encourage them to think about home and personal security. The kebabathon was launched in January 2003 in a mailout to 700,000 NUS members and has been played 40,000 times. The cost was £12,000. Bargain Boost was launched on 7 November 2003. It has been mailed to 5,000 students and played 8,000 times to date. A further mailout to 40,000 students is under way.
A game was also used on the vehicle crime reduction website, www.secureyourmotor.gov.uk. Car Secured was launched in February 2002 at cost £5,000. It has been played 12,000 times since October 2002 (Statistics for February to September 2002 are not available because problems with the web analytics software used mean the data are not reliable).
Online games are a cost-effective means to promote websites to hard to reach audiences who would not naturally think of seeking information from Government websites.