For anyone who doesn’t know much about WI resolutions and campaigning (most of us didn’t until we joined the committee), here’s a brief rundown from last year’s blog post…
The topics we, as WI members, choose to campaign on are decided at the AGM. Initially, any member can put forward issues which they would like the National Federation of Women’s Institutes (NFWI) to consider campaigning on – these are known as resolutions.
Once all the resolutions have been collected, a process of debating and consulting begins. A shortlist of resolutions is debated in Federations and individual WIs; after this period, a final selection of resolutions are taken forward to discuss at the summer AGM.
If a resolution is passed at the AGM, it then becomes a mandate and forms the basis of campaigning and awareness activities carried out throughout the WI membership in the years ahead.
If you want to read a little more about campaigns and the WI, have a look at our Campaigns page which includes a link to the WI website.
The shortlist has been prepared and it’s now our time to vote. There were 51 resolutions submitted and federation representatives narrowed them down to a shortlist of seven. They are (in no particular order):
- The next 100 years.
- Plant a tree for the future.
- Public access to defibrillators
- Failing to care – assessment of need in long-term care
- Cutting back on food waste
- Ending FGM
- To curb the use of antibiotics
WI Life (sent out to members) has more information (p38 of the Nov/Dec issue). In addition to this, as in previous years, we will have a few members writing blog posts with our thoughts (personal to each writer, not the opinion of the whole committee or WI) about the issues suggested. We hope that these will help you all with some background information about each topic but each will still be discussed at the meeting on the 16th of December.
Do you feel strongly about any of the issues suggested above? If so, would you be willing to write a blog post about it? We’re hoping to get the discussions started before the meeting so any input from Sotonettes members would be greatly appreciated. Find out how to contact us here.