A group of six Members of Youth Parliament from across the country today met with Shadow Spokespeople to lobby the Recycling: Free It! campaign. MYP Adam Jogee writes about his experience and what we can expect next;
The now infamous debate in the House of Lords last May, where MYPs from across the UK voted in favour of the 'Recycling: Free it' campaign- has been matched with serious action.
Wednesday 1st April 2009 saw not only President Obama's visit to Prime Minister Brown, but also a meeting between seven MYPs and four Opposition Members of Parliament. Adam Jogee, Aakash Bharania, Jack Light, Richyal Rana, Jacob Rix, Caitlen Moon and Ryan MacDonald met with Liberal Democrat Shadow Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change, Simon Hughes, Shadow Secretary of State for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Tim Farron, Shadow Minister for Climate Change, Martin Horwood and Conservative Shadow Minister for Climate Change, Charles Hendry.
We briefed the Opposition on where the campaign came from, and how it moved through the London Region to the corridors of power in the Lords and then into our Manifesto for 2008. The most important part of the meeting was split in half- with us sharing with the MPs the outrageous results of research conducted by UKYP (which included getting in touch with every local authority in England), the second part of the meeting was discussing the best way forward, i.e. where to take these exclusive figures that we haven't made public yet.
We had commitments from Martin Horwood MP to support us all the way and some positive comments from Charles Hendry too. We will now be working with all Parties to table an EDM, with the support of speakers at this meeting.
I thought it was a great meeting, with all Members left feeling positive about the way forward and the objective ahead. We have the chance to make a real difference and the work has just begun, so watch this space!
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