Benefits of a petition
A petition can help you gain a lot of support very quickly from people in your community.
It is a way for people to get involved with minimal effort.
It helps put pressure on your decision makers by showing how many people care about the issue.
Creating your petition
As a group agree:
what the main issue is
what change you are asking for
The change you are asking for will likely become the petition title and then you can explain the issue in the description. Finish your petition with a sentence asking people to sign the petition to show their support.
Top tip! Evidence is important for petitions. Include relevant photos, quotes and survey results if you have them.
Offline petition
Your sentence asking for sign-ups should be followed by empty lines for people to add their details to show support. Specify what information people should leave, for example, their first and last names.
Online petition
If you are doing your petition online, you can use free websites such as 38 Degrees and Change.org to design your petition.
Top tip! Asking people to include their postcode can help you show local politicians that their constituents care about the issue.
Get support
There are lots of things you can do to get people to sign your petition. For example:
talk about it on social media
host an event, like a film screening or book club