Share

Change is possible, with your help

Sara Booth-Card from The Wildlife Trusts’ Campaigns and Communities team explains why every action our campaigners take matters!

I must confess that I am someone who LOVES data.  I really enjoy digging into what the numbers are trying to tell me! 

When The Wildlife Trusts run campaigns, all sorts of information is collected, including how many people have taken part in the campaign, and how many people have visited that particular webpage. Pretty mundane, but useful. On some of our campaigns you might see a little thermometer displaying how many people have taken part. A little bit fancier than the Blue Peter fundraising one! 

For me, the Planning and Infrastructure Bill campaign was filled with so many juicy data morsels - like a data Christmas pudding. It wasn’t just the number of people sending messages but also which MPs were receiving them, how many emails each MP was sent and most importantly what you, the general public, were saying to those MPs. 

All this data is invaluable and helps us to inform MPs on your views. But it also helps us to back you up and hold MPs and their teams to account. It means we can say to local MPs “we know you got 300 emails about the Planning and Infrastructure Bill” and ask them how they intend to respond. 

It gives also us important evidence to demonstrate to MPs and to Parliament what constituents want and expect from their MPs. We also split this data into local Trust areas. This helps to inform what is happening in people’s local areas. 

As much as I love data, and can talk about its virtues until the cows come home, I know that numbers alone are not enough. As a scientist, I know that having a wider variety of evidence makes things even better! We need numbers and stories together.  

This is why on many of our campaigns, you will often be encouraged to add to a little box which says something along the lines of, “tell your MP what you think…”. Your voice, your story matters as much as information and evidence from organisations like ours, if not more so. It adds real authenticity when you include personal opinions and stories, especially if the issues you write about can be linked to where you live. 

Here are some of those juicy data morsels from the Planning and Infrastructure Bill campaign.  

  • Every single English and Welsh MP received at least 5 emails from their constituents, telling them why nature is important to them
  • The average number of emails sent to each MP was 68
  • Around 115,000 of you sent over 148,000 emails and postcards about the changes to the planning system.  

You may not ever love data as much as me, but I hope this shows everyone why every email, every story, every click matters. 

Added together, this isn’t just numbers - it’s proof that people care deeply about nature and want to see change.  

So please keep speaking up, please keep sharing your stories, and please know that every action you take adds to a bigger picture of hope for the UK’s wildlife and wild places. 

Change is possible. Without all your efforts through this campaign, unbelievably, things would have been worse for wildlife through this Bill. You made those little changes happen and will help shift how decisionmakers view the natural world in future - not as a “nice to have” but as something which is necessary to everyone.  

Read some of your heartfelt messages to MPs

"We will be financial, socially and environmentally worse off. I voted for this Government in good faith that it would support and champion the environment, wildlife and strengthen climate change policies."


"It is vital for the nation that we retain protections for nature and wildlife because so much has already been lost and further losses will lead to serious long-term damage to Britain’s  economy, health and culture."


"I am an architect and know the difficulty of development but once nature is gone, it is gone. There is no real offsetting and replacement that will truly replace nature lost to development. The housing crisis does not actually have to be solved by building housing under the current model. We need to focus on designing existing low density housing, and tackling equality and a few landowners hoarding property."
 

"I am an architect with 45 years’ experience in the building industry. I have not found a commitment to protecting nature, (good both for the environment and our well being), to be an obstacle to good building, but rather an inspiration. We all need a closer relationship with the environment and a better understanding of why ‘bats’ or ‘snails’ are shorthand for complex and often irreplaceable ecosystems, like our Norfolk chalk streams."

Related blog posts