ePetitions - interesting general observations

[Guest]

I've put this in the lounge area because it's just a general observation of ePetitions rather than any discussion about the BA one on another current thread.

 

http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/

 

I was surprised to see that 99.9% of them fail to reach the 100,000 signatures needed to to "trigger the prospect of a Commons debate".  So even the one in a thousand that reach that level of support only "might" trigger a debate.

 

More surprising than that maybe, only 0.7% even reach 10,000 signatures.

 

from: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23441223

 

 

 

 

 

[MauriceMynah]

There was a program on TV recently by a stand-up comedian Dave Gorman. His show "Modern life is goodish" highlighted these e-Polls and their value (or lack of).

 To be honest I think they do no harm and are largely ignored by the powers that be. However, where there's a sudden groundswell of opinion, I understand alarm bells somewhere ring and someone sits up and takes notice.

 

It gotta be a big swell though!

[Guest]

Well this one got 338 signatures.....

 

http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/2843

[JennyMorgan]

Without wishing to enter into yet another ping-pong game of words I think it worth mentioning that whilst very few e-petitions gain sufficient votes, and nor do the originators expect them to, these polls do provide a guide to public opinion and can be used to back up complaints to MP's for example. I don't see them as valueless, rather that they can be a useful tool, if only to prove public concern. All to easy to be negative about these polls by trying to devalue them but they do allow people to support issues that concern them, such as The Broads.

 

Strow, at this particular point in time a predictable topic on your part.

[MauriceMynah]

Sorry Peter but no! I can't agree with you.

 

Lets say an e-poll results in 1000 people saying that Southend Pier should be demolished. What does that tell anyone? It could be read that 65 million *(or what ever the rest of the countries population is) is against the demolition of Southend pier.

 

Let's just say that out favourite quango leader started an e-poll to find out what level of support the NP malarkey would really get. His petition reads "The Norfolk Broads should be turned into a National Park" He also mentions this poll to the RSPB, and it gets a mention in their magazine.

The result is (we shall say in this hypothetical case) 250,000 signatures.

 

What would that tell anyone?

 

He could use it saying that it should happen because it got 250,000 sigs

You could say that it should NOT happen because it got only 250,000 sigs.

[Guest]

....... these polls do provide a guide to public opinion and can be used to back up complaints to MP's for example.......

 

 

Yes Peter, it will therefore be very interesting to see just how many people do sign as having "no confidence in the BA". I certainly do not feel that strongly about their occasional mistakes.

 

It's a two way street, if there's several thousand, it will indeed show that a significant number of people share your views.

 

If the result is somewhat less, it will be an equally strong indication of the opposite.

 

The "Broads Toll Payers Association" followed a similar ethos, and has now reached 206 members after two years, and a high proportion of those appear to be spammers now.

[Oddfellow]

Most E-petitions are posted by people who don't have the ability to garner enough publicity for the petition.

 

If this were the closure of a local hospital or similarly valuable service, then there woud be a mobilisation of local people hitting the streets with clip boards, photcopying leaflets, occupying prominent positions on high streets, leaving copies behind the bars of pubs and so on.

 

The mere fact that the petition lives in cyberspace begins to reduce this publicty to places where only certain people frequent. Immediately, you have a vastly reduced publicty and support base.

 

Standing on street corners and discuissing your views and encouraging people to sign up also draws the interest of the media, and whilst there is nothing to prevent an e-petition from being publicised by a press release, many people who use the internet in this way have a too small an understanding or abilty properly publicise its existence.

 

Like any other web page out there, an e-petition needs publicity. It's fighting for page views with trillions of others. Little wonder, then, that most gather fewer than 1000 signitures.

 

But here's the nub. Even if you are great at publicising the e-petition and manage to get, say, 200,000 page views on it, you need 50% of those viewing to sign up. Therefore, you need to make the petition easy to read, easy to understand and easy to put your name to. A peition that calls for too much, is poorly constructed, difficult to understand, too radical or just ridiculous won't gain support, no matter how many people you put it in front of.

 

So, in order to be properly supported, an e-petition needs to be

 

1) Meticulously planned

2) Easy to understand

3) Remarkably well publicised

 

Sounds simple, but this rarely within the capabilities of one person. This is a campaign like any other.

[MauriceMynah]

Totally agree Andy but I'd go further and say that a poorly supported poll might very well be used by it's opponents to illustrate the lack of support that movement received.

[Guest]

Totally agree Andy but I'd go further and say that a poorly supported poll might very well be used by it's opponents to illustrate the lack of support that movement received.

 

Yes, Andy has given a very good synopsis of ePetitions and their difficulties.

 

With less than one in a thousand reaching the point where they "might" be considered for a Commons debate, and less than one in a hundred reaching 10,000 signatures, the overwhelming majority actually highlight the minimal support for their proposers.

 

The earlier comment "anything is better than nothing" is quite naive in this case.

 

Trying to turn the specifically questionable BA National Park renaming into a global "no confidence" campaign was a step way too far, clouding that clear-cut issue with personal anti BA and anti JP agendas.

 

248 votes so far, and if it does not reach several thousand, it will actually assist the BA in their current aims.

[Paladin]

Here’s a view of the value (or otherwise) of epetitions.

 

Take the case of the campaign for creating a Greater London National Park, which has some high-profile supporters and which was launched in the media on 1 April 2014. Although there are around 8.6 million inhabitants (who would presumably have an interest) in the Greater London area, only 2,100 have signed the petition, or about 0.025%, after 10 months of active campaigning.

 

Now add the number of toll payers (10,000) to the number of inhabitants of the Broads (6,000) = 16,000 who might be expected to have an interest in the status of the Broads. 325 people have signed the ‘anti-Broads-National-Park’ FB petition =2.03%. Even if the number is made up to an unlikely 20,000, to allow for hirers who might be involving themselves in the discussions, it’s still 1.6%. And that’s after only about a fortnight, with very little active campaigning.

 

Those figure, in reality, don’t mean anything at all, but I expect someone will try to make something out of them

[Guest]

.....Those figure, in reality, don’t mean anything at all, but I expect someone will try to make something out of them

 

Very true Paladin, I expect somebody will try to make something out of them....

 

326 now...

[Oddfellow]

Coffee aroma......

 

This isn't going to get the support that it needs to be taken any notice of. No end of campaigning will work.

 

Let me use an analogy I used when ran a web development company. Many times, we would get new clients telling us that they wanted more visitors to their web site and were prepared to pay me to get them there.

 

I told many that I wouldn't take their money as their web site was terrible; the point being that if I was successful is growing their visitor numbers, few would stick around because the site was s***e. What, then, was the point in wasting money flogging a dead horse?

 

The horse needed reviving before any such task was begun, but really, the horse needed replacing with a prime stallion. Too few people appreciated the truth and flogged on anyway, wasting valuable time and money whilst their competitors got it right and stole the customers.

 

The same is true here. An epetition needs a definite focus and not a splatter of ideas, some that will appear to some, but where all are unlikely to appeal to many.

[Guest]

......The same is true here. An epetition needs a definite focus and not a splatter of ideas, some that will appeal to some, but where all are unlikely to appeal to many.

 

Quite a concise summary Andy.

 

A total "vote of no confidence in the BA", which will now be proven to show how little support such an extreme view has.

 

The alleged "little people" have been divided and shown to be a genuinely little group of the not so little people.

[Paladin]

In 2010, the Green Party gained one MP on slightly less than 1% of the vote. There was/is even talk of them being invited to take part in the TV political head-to-head debates. The epetition has received over 2% of the potential electorate (although it is impossible to say who actually voted).

 

It doesn't do to be dismissive of 'the little people'.

[Paladin]

Here's another anology that has just sprung to mind.

 

Many, many moons ago, very much pre-Scargill, when I was starting work and the trades unions had power and were genuinely respected, I refused to join, as I didn't approve of the political levy. I felt free choice was being taken away from me, regardless of my own political views.

 

Then I realised that the union in my workplace was the only voice the bosses listen to, whether it was regarding working conditions or pay levels. People like me, who weren't union members, who sat back and made no contribution, financial or otherwise, nevertheless benefited from the hard work carried out by proactive union members, to improve pay and conditions.

 

It rather made me feel a bit like a leech, feeding off the labours of others. I joined the union (which soon after allowed an opt-out from the levy, so everyone was satisfied).

 

 

[Guest]

.....It rather made me feel a bit like a leech, feeding off the labours of others......

 

Not wishing to sign the ePetition doesn't make me feel like a leech.

 

In the same way you're disappointed by people not signing, I'll be disappointed if many people do, because I would not like to see the Broads Authority deposed by a total vote of no-confidence.

 

I'm mindful of what they could be replaced with, rather than applying pressure to any specific shortcomings in their performance of their duty.

 

But that's our prerogative, we can each support what we believe is best. Proving who is right is beyond anything that can be said on here, only time will tell.

[SPEEDTRIPLE]

One of the biggest drawbacks of e-petitions is thatoften, those affected by the item on petition, know nothing about said petition. What a lot of people still seem to forget is that more than 40% of this country`s population don`t own or have access to the internet, and i some case WON`T WANT access, so they will never know, or have, or want access to e-petitions.   I said on another thread elswhere that when we`ve been on the broads, most of the people we talk to when moored know nothing about, and mostly, have no interrest in the NBN, or other Broads forums. With that in mind, and the fact that many will not want anything to do with pcs or the internet, then things like e-petitions etc will get very little publicity, which is another way of making Andy`s (freedom) point..

 

 

Yet another analagy, which some people find hard to understand, years ago, probably back in the 80s, and long before sattelite or cable tv, the BBC broadcast a programme that was to some, disgusting, and not fit to be broadcast on publically funded tv channels. It was reported in the press that the BBC had many hundreds of complaints regarding this programme, to which the BBC publically apollogised, and dropped it immediately.  Now, with only 4 tv channels at the time, and the BBC enjoying MILLIONS of viewers for most of their programmes, many hundreds, being less than 1,000 is not exactly a majority, not even a slight one at that. So to think just because an e-petition only gets 300+signatures out of 16,000 or whatever the figure, is not significant coud be misguided.

 

In some circumstances, the minority do rule.

[JennyMorgan]

Maybe, Strowager, there are people who clearly know more about the subject than you do and people who know and realise just how the BA's executive works. However you look at it, a man that promotes a lie and refuses to take several ministerial no's, including a very recent one, for an answer is . . . . . . . . . well, I'll leave that for you to decide. Purely my opinion, of course, and no, I'm not going to enter into further argument.  

[SPEEDTRIPLE]

Maybe, Strowager, there are people who clearly know more about the subject than you do and people who know and realise just how the BA's executive works. However you look at it, a man that promotes a lie and refuses to take several ministerial no's, including a very recent one, for an answer is . . . . . . . . . well, I'll leave that for you to decide. Purely my opinion, of course, and no, I'm not going to enter into further argument.  

 

Absolutely spot on :clap

[Paladin]

You only have to look at the National Parks' web site, jobs section. The BA is advertising two jobs, using their new national park logo. Take a peek here http://www.nationalparks.gov.uk/aboutus/jobs

 

Wouldn't you think the logo would be plastered all over the Authority's own site? It doesn't appear once. Why not, if Dr Packman feels secure in his domain?

 

Sneak it in here, sneak it in there, seems to be the tactic. Disgraceful, IMO!

 

And the members, as a collective, are letting him get away with it. I feel sorry for the ones who could see what was happening, but were out-voted. Confidence in the Broads Authority? What a joke.

 

[Guest]

. . . . . . . . well, I'll leave that for you to decide. Purely my opinion, of course, and no, I'm not going to enter into further argument.  

 

Exactly.......

 

As I say, only time will tell.

 

A handful of people are now pushing the same argument very strongly on this forum, and everyone else has given up trying to debate the subject.

 

Quite understandable really.

[Paladin]

It might be the same underlying argument, but it is one that is still alive and still developing.

 

Debates are given up on for any number of reasons. It might be a lack of understanding of the issues which prevents someone joining in in the first place, or perhaps complacency, or perhaps simply running out of arguments.

 

The number of views a thread gets is some indication of the interest, even though those viewers might not post, or even be members of the forum.

[BroadScot]

I wonder how many BA NP badges are now on the Rangers uniform? If any at all? Oh and if so, will they be discreet? I for one come May will be asking them why they are allowed too display such a falsehood. Just my slant on this thread, mod cap off!

 

 

Iain.

[Paladin]

I wonder how many BA NP badges are now on the Rangers uniform? If any at all? Oh and if so, will they be discreet? I for one come May will be asking them why they are allowed too display such a falsehood. Just my slant on this thread, mod cap off!

 

 

Iain.

Sorry to disagree, BroadScot, but the rangers will do as they are told. It's a job for them. Why should they take any stick for something over which they have no control? It's the other end of the food chain that requires our attention.

 

Why wait until May? Questions should be being asked NOW...of the Authority members, MPs, Defra and regulatory bodies (to name just a few). Questions are being asked, believe me, but the more who ask them, the greater the chance of getting answers. No need for laboriously written letters, either. Everything can be done on line, by email or web forms. Easy peasy.

[BroadScot]

Pally only said May as its my next time down. I have already emailed BA, and had no reply. Its not my intention to grill the Rangers, but to ask politely what they though of it all. 

 

 

Iain.