Has anybody ever signed a petition and achieved the result they were after? There is a 4 million signature petition being delivered today to try and save rural post offices and post ofice card accounts, i doubt it will work but if it doesn't then what does that say about our government that is supposed to represent our wishes?
Petitions
- Thread starter ovverbruv
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archie
Senior Jockey
What about the 56 million that didn't sign?
You really want government by petition? At what level would a petition become binding?
You really want government by petition? At what level would a petition become binding?
Desert Orchid
Senior Jockey
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- Aug 2, 2005
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Petitions can work if they're backed up with publicity. I've never heard of this one. They're much more likely to work if they're aimed at local authorities and/or local politicians.
I'm sure Dessies dead right. Ward council electoral majorities are typically lower than 500. Given that rural Britain doesn't really vote Labour anyway, I'm sure that a Government that doesn't need them, won't listen to them. Thatcher was quite cynical at exploiting this, so long as she took the C1's and aspiring C2's into the electoral booth with her, the conservative electroal arithmatic was balanced in he rfavour, which allowed her to disregard those classes and parts of the country that didn't vote for her with penicious impunity. No one suffered more so that the Scots who became an electoral test bed for her worst excesses such as a certain tax. The tradtional industrial heartlands could be treated similarly, so long the emerging sunrise manufacturers of the M4 and M11 corridors, backed by C2 home owners in the South East (the so called Essex man) and semi skilled artisans in construction related trades could pcik up the short fall.
Have I signed a petition?, quite a few I should think. Has it led to change? not really. Change did occur though, South Africa being a case in point, but some how I put that down to the combined effects of sanctions, and some not so well publicised military reverses that threatend to bring the fight back over the border and right into middle class white suburbs. It's difficult to go there today and not form the opinion that the true beneficiaries of the fall of apartheid hasn't been the white businessman. There is a nouveau riche black middle class emerging etc but the townships still remain chronically poor, and some of the ghettos of Jo'burg are even more fightening.
The sad fact is that if you want investment in your area through regional policy the best way of achieving it has historically been to riot. It scares the establishment into action much more so than any petition ever will. Note the French students of late. Do we really think that the Thatcher government would have pumped all that regeneration money into Liverpool through the Merseyside Development Corporation if they hadn't momentarily lost control of Toxteth for a few days in 1981. It was only when Trafalgar Square and places like Windsor went into civil revolt and violence that the poll tax was finally dead.
Have I signed a petition?, quite a few I should think. Has it led to change? not really. Change did occur though, South Africa being a case in point, but some how I put that down to the combined effects of sanctions, and some not so well publicised military reverses that threatend to bring the fight back over the border and right into middle class white suburbs. It's difficult to go there today and not form the opinion that the true beneficiaries of the fall of apartheid hasn't been the white businessman. There is a nouveau riche black middle class emerging etc but the townships still remain chronically poor, and some of the ghettos of Jo'burg are even more fightening.
The sad fact is that if you want investment in your area through regional policy the best way of achieving it has historically been to riot. It scares the establishment into action much more so than any petition ever will. Note the French students of late. Do we really think that the Thatcher government would have pumped all that regeneration money into Liverpool through the Merseyside Development Corporation if they hadn't momentarily lost control of Toxteth for a few days in 1981. It was only when Trafalgar Square and places like Windsor went into civil revolt and violence that the poll tax was finally dead.
Yes, I've signed all sorts of petitions, since they at least represent the percentage of people who'll actually bother to do so, but I wouldn't say that they have an effect in themselves. As Warbler suggests, it's more likely that change comes from an unrelenting process of petitioning, annoying your local MPs, writing to the Press, forming action groups, leafletting, fund-raising, gaining publicity, marching politely if noisily, protesting and waving banners and, if necessary, taking to the streets and being really unruly. I don't think just one feature of opposition will get things achieved, but unless people are willing to put their names or their actions to something, then absolutely nothing ever will.