This blog post gives simple step-by-step instructions on how to create your first e-Petition on Cambridgeshire County Councils (CCC) e-Petition website.
Go to the website;
http://epetition.cambridgeshire.public-i.tv/epetition_core/community/page/index
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| Cambridgeshire County Council's e-Petitions Website |
Select the "Register" link (top-right, highlighted above);
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| CCC e-Petition Website Registration Pages |
As an alternative to creating an account you can always just login with your accounts from any of the following;
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| CCC e-Petition Website Supported Sign-In Providers |
You will still have to complete your contact details, but you will be able to use your Twitter/ Yahoo/ OpenID/ Google/ Aol account to login to the website.
Once you have registered (or if you just login on the main screen) you will see the following page;
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| CCC e-Petitions Website "My Activities" Page |
Click on "Add a petition" on the left;
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| CCC e-Petition Website "Add a petition" Page | | |
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You now need to complete the petition details. The following notes maybe useful;
- What do you want to achieve? If you want to present your petition at a meeting of the Full Council then you should look at the County Councils website and pick an end-date at least 2-weeks before a meeting (but still allowing you enough time to collect signatures)
- Is this just an on-line petition or do you want the ability to submit paper signatures as well? Technically there is no reason why you wouldn't tick *both* check-boxes as you can then just submit zero signatures of the type you don't want to use but if you change your mind later it's a lot easier if you check the box at this stage!
- You will be contacted by an Officer from the County Council within a couple of days of creating your petition. It's vital your email address is up to date (and you might want to check your Spam Folder just in case!)
- If you are submitting a petition on behalf of or organisation or group it's vital that you agree a wording with them in advance - this will solve a lot of problems in the long run
- Stay away from politics (unless that's your aim). Saying how rubbish the Conservative administration is at something is unlikely to convince a) them to change their minds, or b) their supporters to sign your petition. Equally declaring what a triumph Liberal Democrat, Labour, Green, or UKIP policy is in a specific area in the text of your petition is unlikely to motivate people of a different political persuasion to sign it even less the Conservative administration to adopt it! The broader appeal you have in your petition the more likely people are to sign it and circulate it to their friends/ colleagues!
Once your petition has been approved all you need to do now is collect signatures!
