ME Association: Speak Up for M.E. in the General Election: Contact Your Candidates!| 19 November 2019

ME Association: Speak Up for M.E. in the General Election: Contact Your Candidates!| 19 November 2019

https://www.meassociation.org.uk/20...ion-contact-your-candidates-19-november-2019/

Dr Charles Shepherd, Hon. Medical Adviser, ME Association.

This month the ME Association website survey is asking what you think should be the top issues for MPs to lobby about in the new parliament. We also wanted to give you the opportunity to ask your candidates ahead of the general election what their thoughts were on these main concerns.

Don’t forget to register to vote. The deadline for voter registration is 21 November if you live in Northern Ireland, and 26 November if you live in England, Wales or Scotland. Postal ballots are a good option if you are unable to leave your home. Full details are available here and on your local authority’s website.

Below you will find a selection of issues that have attracted most votes to date from the survey, and some of the additional comments and concerns shared by members of the M.E. community.

You might feel that these concerns are ones that you share, or you might have more personal or local concerns that you want to canvass your candidates about and whose response might influence the way in which you cast your ballot on 12th December.

We have created a template letter that you can use to email or write to your candidates. You can add the issues of most concern to you and remove those you feel are less relevant.

We recommend you personalise the letter where possible and, if you are able, we suggest handwriting the letter as this might improve the chance of a response…

 

I do not have an MP.

No one in the UK does.

If I can't write to an MP about other matters, because they aren't currently an MP, or doing anything for their constituents (because they aren't an MP), then why would they pay any attention to, or even read, such a letter?

Good idea, lousy timing.

 

I did this for the elections in Belgium this year and a surprisingly high number of politicians responded. And not just a standardized response from their staff, but an actual response written by them and sometimes with a personal anecdote that they know somebody with ME/CFS or a related illness. Although things may be different in the UK (I suspect we have more MP's per capita), I suspect this is worth the effort (it doesn't take too long to personalise a template letter).

The politician might simply write: "Ok I'll do my best" and then ignore it. But the next time somebody raises the issue of ME/CFS he might remember your letter and take the issue more seriously than he/she otherwise would. I think this is how Carol Monaghan got involved, because of feedback from some of her constituents. So sometimes it makes a difference.

My intuition would be to keep the letter as short as possible. Basically, I would explain how your family has been affected by this horrible illness, how there are thousands of patients in the UK receiving inadequate care and how there's almost no funding for biomedical research. Say that other MP's like Carol Monaghan are doing important things and that you hope that he/she will also do what they can to help ME/CFS sufferers. I would wait with providing more info until they get back to you, otherwise, it might seem that you're just distributing pamphlets and standard information.

That's my view on it. Good luck UK ME/CFS'ers!

 

Exactly. Just when I'd written to mine about my caree's PIP appeal, too. Boris' timing sucks.

Mind you, the MEA mentions writing to candidates, not MPs.

Another aspect people might like to tackle is the current disability benefits system in relation to longstanding and variable illnesses such as ME ...

 

This is, as far as I recall from when I read it, mentioned in the suggested template.