Take 5 minutes to email your MP about Lyme Bay

[Lisa Chilton]

Thank you if you have already have supported The Wildlife Trusts’ Save Lyme Bay Reefs campaign by signing our online petition and writing to Defra (see www.savelymebayreefs.org).

We have one more thing you can do to make a difference: email your MP asking for his/her support.There are4 simple steps (see below), and it should take no more than 5 minutes.

What’s this about?
With our support, an MP called Adrian Sanders (Torbay) has written an Early Day Motion calling for the Lyme Bay Reefs to be protected. Early Day Motions (EDMs) are formal motions submitted for debate in the House of Commons. They are used to publicise the views of individual MPs, draw attention to specific events or campaigns, and demonstrate the extent of parliamentary support for a particular cause or point of view. An MP can add their signature to an EDM to show their support.

What does the EDM say?
EDM 359: PROTECTION OF REEFS IN LYME BAY (started 22.11.2007 by Adrian Sanders MP). That this House welcomes the current Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs public consultation on measures to protect the marine biodiversity of reefs in Lyme Bay; recognises that these habitats are of national, if not international, conservation importance and can support a range of sustainable economic activities, including potting, sports diving and sea angling, providing a significant return to local businesses; further recognises that the needs of wildlife and of these local businesses are threatened by scallop dredging which slowly destroys the habitats on which they all depend, for less than half the return from the same area; believes that the protection of the Lyme Bay reefs is urgently required on environmental and economic grounds; and therefore calls on the Government to introduce statutory protection for the entire 60 square miles of the Lyme Bay reefs, which constitutes less than 10 per cent of the whole of Lyme Bay.

4 steps to email your MP

1.
If you’re not sure, check who your MP is. Visit www.theyworkforyou.com and type in your postcode.
2.
Find out whether your MP has already signed the Lyme Bay EDM. Visit EDMDetails to see the list of MPs that have signed.
3.
If your MP hasn’t already signed, send him/her an email. Visit www.theyworkforyou.com, enter your postcode to select your MP, then click on ‘Send a message to…’. All you need to say is “I am concerned that the Lyme Bay Reefs are being destroyed by scallop dredging. I urge you to sign EDM 359 Protection of Reefs in Lyme Bay.”
4.
Email me to let me know that you have done it. Please use marine@wildlifetrusts.org, put ‘EDM’ in the subject header, and let me know which MP you have contacted.

Many thanks for your support. If Lyme Bay finally gets the protection that it needs, it could pave the way for other treasured underwater sites to be saved.

Lisa Chilton
The Wildlife Trusts

[keith_henson]

done,

good old widdy is my local MP. She should sort something out - other than dealing with crap local hospitals

[Jules77]

Done - not sure whether the MP for Islington will be interested but worth a try

[dry suit diver]

I have done but as Harry Cohen and his staff are more interested in his expenses claim I don't expect a reply

[Adrian Kelland]

My MP used to be the fisheries minister - I know he couldn't care less. He had plenty of opportunity to push for protective legislation while in post. He didn't.

Adrian

[milldog]

[Jenkins]

Any one know brail?

I've heard it said (probably an urban myth) that no one in his office reads brail so at least that way it will go straight to Mr Blunket himself - that said it would probably have just as much effect if I addressed it to the dog (synical? me?).


Done