The Bournemouth Daily Echo has teamed up with sister title the Dorset Echo to run a lengthy liveblog session today on MPs expenses.

Three local MPs, Jim Knight, Tobias Ellwood and Annette Brooke, will each take turns to answer questions from readers, which the papers have been receiving all week.

The session, which commenced at 10am using liveblogging software CoveritLive, is an experiment for the news team, Sam Shepherd, online journalist at the Bournemouth title, told Journalism.co.uk.

The paper's sport desk has used liveblogging to cover football matches, a couple of news items have been covered in this way and a liveblog on the extreme snowfall in February exceeded expectations, Shepherd said.

"We've been looking for another opportunity to use liveblogging. It's a good way of showing the newsroom the possibilities," said Shepherd, who will run the liveblog with another digital journalist and member of the newsdesk.

The liveblog has been set up in response to the number of questions and comments for MPs left by readers on news coverage of the story, she said.

Comments left so far have been sensible, added Shepherd, and all questions will be published unless there are legal issues.

"When we asked we really didn't think that the MPs would say yes, but it's a good way of getting them to speak directly with their constituents," she said.

The Bournemouth paper has created a topic page and news feed linking to all of its coverage of the expenses scandal, which has generated a boost in web traffic. The paper has also received an offer from a reader to write for the special MPs section.

"This story given us the opportunity to do different things on the internet. We've pulled together all the information that we can, in particular, content that we wouldn't use in the paper. It's very good as as a demonstration of the potential for displaying stories on the internet," said Shepherd.

The Newsquest titles intend to invite more local MPs to participate in liveblogging sessions in coming weeks.

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