Save us from e-petition mania
Thursday, August 4, 2011 at 17:54 
As noted elsewhere, the Government has today launched its new e-petitions website.
There is a time and a place for petitions (I'm not a fan, in general) but you've got to be in it to win it, so they say.
This afternoon, therefore, a petition has been submitted with the title 'Save Our Pubs and Clubs: Amend the Smoking Ban'.
There are still several hoops to jump through so goodness knows whether it will be accepted. Watch this space.
PS. My worst fears about this Government initiative/gimmick are being realised. All afternoon the e-petition website has carried the message 'Sorry if you're experiencing problems accessing e-petitons. There is currently a much higher level of demand than we expected'.
No doubt every pressure group and activist in the country is busy submitting a petition. Every nutter too. God help us.
Simon Clark
The BBC website asks 'Will e-petitions bring in a new era of debate?'.
Includes a quote from this blog.
Reader Comments (13)
Only petitions which back Govt thinking on policy will be accepted so my guess is that we will be dismissed with the "cranks and nutters." The coalition didn't listen on the fake Freedom Bill/Great Repeal Bill and I'm too cynical to believe it will listen now because it has a set agenda on lifestyle issues including smoking. The last No 10 E-Petition site has made me skeptical that this is any more than a means to make pet political issues look popular while giving the appearance of a listening Govt which has proved itself exactly the same as the last.
Well said Pat!
Too cynical, people. Pat, have you seen some of the petitions already tabled which are well out of line with government policy? They may not be listened to, but the debate is intensified if they are supported - politics is a long game, remember.
God speed, Simon. I'll be more than happy to spread the word if it's accepted.
Just took a look and the site’s back up and running again. As with the Great Repeal site, it’s largely being used as a platform for many people to air their personal and, quite frankly, rather trivial (in the overall scheme of things) gripes. Clearly quite a lot of people haven’t grasped the fact that 100,000 signatures merely mean that a topic will be raised in Parliament (and could therefore be quickly dismissed out of hand), and are confusing it with the Repeal site in thinking that if they get the required number of signatures then their wishes will automatically be voted through. One really does wonder about the level of smartness of huge swathes of the population sometimes …
And as usual with all Government initiatives, it hasn’t been thought through properly and clearly isn’t being monitored at all one a topic’s been approved, so that many subjects are getting mentioned dozens of times with each petition getting just a few measly votes, which tends to make me think (cynic that I am when it comes to politicians) that it’s yet another PR exercise rather than a genuine attempt to respond to the public’s wishes, or even to ascertain their views. After all, if they get 100 separate petitions on the same topic, each with 1000 votes, they won’t have to address the issue, will they, because no one petition will have achieved the requisite number of votes? It’s a shame really. If properly organised and properly intentioned it could have been a useful tool for both politicians and the public.
No sign of yours yet, Simon, but I’ll keep an eye open. Flag us all up if you get notified that it’s in.
This is an issue they'll expect to raise it's head, along with Capital punishment, EU referendum, etc. It's one of the top issues as with the great repeal bill. Let's wait and see how they deal with it this time.
It should at least tell them that it isn't going away.
I hope it succeeds. If we don't keep trying, then the antis will think we don't care. We can't allow them to think that - can we?
One thing does puzzle me though, about this site. If it has just been launched, and it takes several days for a petition to be looked at and approved – then how come the first petition about stopping smoking in prisons appeared so quickly at the top?
To want to stop smoking in prisons is unlikely to come from any member of the public, but rather more from an anti-smoking lobby group. Would they have been informed before anyone else about this proposed site so that they could get in first?
Good point JJ. I can also wonder if it is not actually one raised FOR the government, but of course, without any direct connection!
Cynical? Me? Whatever makes anyone think that!!
Oops, sorry JJ, of course anti-smoking lobby group IS on behalf of the government!
OK, so I'm cynical but I'll continue jumping through the hoops and if you post a link Simon, then I'll sign it and wait and see how long it takes before we're ignored this time.
Tobacco Duty. http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/329
Where is it?
I find it suspicious that there isn't a single "Repeal The Ban" suggestion considering the last site was flooded with smoking ban suggestions within minutes (to the point Clegg had to make a video on that specific topic) and it was one of the most highly voted topics there. Yet this time there isn't even one? And we know Simon has submitted one. So where is it?
Conspiracy?
You and me both, Mr A. I've just taken another look at the site and there's absolutely no mention of the smoking ban anywhere in sight, apart from the prison one, buried away with less than 100 votes on page 6. It seems doubly strange that there aren't even any antis on there demanding more restrictions on smoking - it's the kind of thing that one would imagine would bring the anti astroturfers out in full force. Have they been warned off, do you think, or are they lying low and waiting for ASH (or some other organisation/individual that they've been pre-warned about) to propose some extension to the ban, so that they can all vote on that one motion and ensure that it gets enough votes to get raised in Parliament? Actually, that's not a bad idea. Maybe we should adopt the same tactic (just in case anyone on here is thinking of submitting a motion) and wait for Simon's to appear, if it ever does.
Or it could just be that as an issue there's been a behind-the-scenes decision that motions of any kind about The Ban are to be quietly ignored. I get the impression that since they got into power, this Coalition has tacitly agreed that the smoking ban is to be a taboo subject, not to be approached under any circumstances whether in respect of fewer restrictions or of further ones. I think it's just too much of a political hot potato for them to want to address it, because they know that they're damned whatever they do. Further restrictions are likely to bring criticism from the fast-growing numbers of people (including many erstwhile supporters of the legislation) who, having experienced the ban for the last four years are now beginning to see that it is, and was always intended to be, unfair, unreasonable and heavy-handed; any relaxation will bring immediate censure from the powerful anti-smoking lobbies. And either way it'll bring this very heated topic right back into the limelight where they don't want it. Of course, they could have only allowed anti comments about the ban to appear, but it would be just a little bit too obvious, then, wouldn't it, that petitions calling for relaxation of the rules were being deliberately shelved, and that would show the whole thing up as a complete sham.