Research Dossier- ‘We are a Perfect Family!’
Our Campaign is named ‘We are a Perfect Family!’ We decided to campaign against David Cameron’s married couples tax allowance, as it is only benefiting married straight couples/families that one of the parents does not work.
• Background Information on referendum: The referendum that will take place on May 2011 all over the United Kingdom is to see if they will change the voting system in the UK for how they elect members of parliament. They will either change it to the Alternative Vote electoral system or remain with the First-past-the-post. This is a simple yes or no question. The Alternative Vote is a voting system used to elect one winner by ranking them in order with numbers. The current system, First-past-the-post, is an election that is won by the highest polling candidate. The votes will be counted on the same day as the lection, from 4pm on Friday. (BBC news)
• Why is it pressing now? Why do we want to take action on the issue? As mentioned above our campaign wants to give the chance to any kind of couple/family (single father, homosexual couples and so on) have some benefits too or at least be accepted for their choices. In addition, we want to make David Cameron cancel this new tax allowance and instead of spending this amount of money supporting only one kind of family, he should think of supporting all kinds of families or maybe give the money on children benefits etc.
• Why should people support us? People should support us because we are living in the 21st century where all the different family structures are acceptable, gay people are allowed to get married, being a single parent is the most normal thing, marriage is not that important any more. And it is not fare that our government is trying to push us further to get married, to get benefits out of it. Marriage does not always bring the happiness in a family, it does not always help to rise our kids any better, it does not always solve the problems and conflicts that rise in our everyday life, why should it bring us the support, and after all what is £3.00 per week? What difference does it make in our life? We are living in a democratic society, where we are all equal and we should not be treated any differently for such thing as being married. It is a lot to do with the media as well, as all we see around us in media are the ‘perfect’ family structures, beautiful, wealthy parents, gorgeous kids, nice house, new car and a dog. This does not exist in our reality!
• Our Target Group: Our target group was the whole nation, it is important that people in our society know that there are many different family structures and marriage does not always create the family, people do, everyone in the whole world should know that. From a teenager to a 70 year old man.
• How will change happen? Change will happen when people say what they mean and do not let our government to make the decisions for us. They can not discriminate us.
• Other campaign groups: Most of the campaign groups in our module are campaigning about Politics, environment or health. There are not other groups who have decided to campaign about the similar topic as our group. We contacted some other Lesbian & Gay organisations and “Don’t Judge my Family” that could help us but they did not respond to any of our calls or e-mails.
Bibliography • Rowling,J.K.(2010) The Single Mother’s manifesto. (Online). Available at: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article7096786.ece [Accessed 5 May 2011] • Smith, A. (2010) Don’t Judge My Family. (online). Available at: http://www.labourlist.org/dont-judge-my-family-alex-smith-tories-marriage-tax [Accessed 4 May 2011] • Evening Standard (2010) David Cameron's tax breaks for married couples will mainly benefit rich, say Labour. (Online). Available at: http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23797285-ed-balls-under-fire-over-number-of-health-visitors.do
[Accessed 5 May 2011]
• Toynbee, P. (2010) Nick Clegg and Gordon Brown need to turn their guns on the real enemy. (Online). Available at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/apr/17/clegg-brown-tory-big-society [Accessed 5 May 2011] • HM Revenue and Customs, Married Couple's Allowance - includes civil partnerships, (online). Available at: http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/incometax/married-allow.htm [Accessed 5 May 2010]