Campaigning

• Get your facts right. Gather as much information as you can about the issue and make sure it is accurate and objective. Your campaign will have no credibility if it is founded on inaccuracies, is too subjective, or simply made up of anecdotal information.
   
• Don’t get personal. Take a professional approach and remember that other people are entitled to an opinion. You are more likely to be listened to if you put across a factual case in a reasoned way, than if you are strident or abusive.
   
• Use the media carefully. The press can be extremely helpful in publicising your campaign, but remember that their first priority is to get a good story – they are not there to take sides.

A campaign group, if well organised and constructive, can often influence the outcome of a planning application or some other decision. You may consider dropping a note with a contact number through the letter boxes of other properties likely to be affected by the proposal in order to start up a group. A website can also be set up to update progress.

Some other tips

• If the issue is of major local significance it may be worth approaching your MP, MSP, AM or MLA.
   
• Ask as many people as possible to write individual letters of objection to the proposals. Individual letters from local people are usually more effective than petitions.
   
• Contact pressure groups and conservation bodies such as the Campaign to Protect Rural England, the Campaign for the Protection of Rural Wales, Rural Scotland, the Wildlife Trusts, the Association of Gardens Trusts, Friends of the Earth or more specialist organisations such as the Bat Conservation Trust, the National Federation of Badger Groups, Butterfly Conservation, Plantlife, or the Wildfowl and Wetlands Trust. Involvement of these bodies could help to raise the profile, influence and tempo of a campaign – but make the contact as early as possible, passing on full details of the issues.
   
• Contact local newspapers and local radio stations. They may be willing to give some publicity to your case, especially if you are planning any kind of protest which they can feature. You will need to convince them that there is a good story so try to think of interesting and different angles to the case.
   
• In some cases, local communities trying to save their local wood end up buying it. The Woodland Trust has set up the Community Woodland Network to help and support such groups with their efforts. Telephone us on 01476 581111 or go to the website - click here.

Find out more

• Friends of the Earth have a number of campaigning guides available from their website - click here.
  These include:
  • How to win, saving wildlife sites
  • How to win, a guide to successful community campaigning
  • How to stop and influence planning permission (2nd edition)

  and other specialist guides on campaigning against rail, housing and other development
   

• Friends of the Earth Scotland also have a number of publications available from their website - click here.
  These include:
  • Environmental campaigning
  • Protecting our environment: a citizen’s guide to environmental rights and action
     
• CPRE produce The CPRE Campaigners’ guide, Getting organised and getting results, which goes through some of the basic techniques and tactics of planning and implementing successful campaigns. You can download this from the CPRE website - click here.