Campaigns

,  We support the WI national campaigns. These aim to respond to issues which affect society and have been identified by the national membership, through the Resolutions process, as ones where the WI can make a difference.

Campaigns have included End Plastic Soup, Alleviate Loneliness, Reduce Food Waste and Parity for Mental Health. We try to take local action to further the campaign issues. We completed the NFWI survey of information about product life and storage on labelling in supermarkets, and discussions about reducing our use of plastics resulted in members using new products to replace cling film and to trap micro fibres in washing machines.

2025 The Resolution for this year, adopted at the Annual Meeting of NFWI on 4 June: is Bystanders can be Lifesavers. Our meeting in June was on this topic when Alex Harrison, a Community First Responder was our inspiring speaker.and the committee hope to arrange other ways of furthering the campaign locally.

As we did last year, members took part in the national water testing during the period Friday 25 to Monday 28 April.

2024 We continued to support the campaign for clean rivers in 2024. Five members took part in the Great UK Water Blitz in September. We used the kits supplied by Earthwatch Europe to test the quality of the water at five different locations locally, including the canal, Adderbury Lakes and the Sor brook mill stream. The tests measured the amount of phosphates and nitrates in the water. Some of the sampled water also contributed to a research project being run at Imperial college London.

2023 The Resolution for 2023, adopted at the Annual Meeting of NFWI at the end of May, was ‘Clean Rivers for Wildlife and People’. It is designed to improve the quality of water in our rivers by increasing the number of designated bathing places. There is a legal requirement for the monitoring of sites given this status and better conditions in any site would have the effect of improving the quality of the water in other parts of the river. In support of this Resolution our branch arranged a public meeting with speakers from the Cotswold River Trust. Members from other branches and from different local organisations with a particular interest in water quality joined us  for an informative and stimulating presentation. Our eye-catching activity as part of the Village Activity Day in September succeeded in raising interest and provoking discussion about the problem of sewage pollution. In October our Vice-president took part in a training session on monitoring water quality. The craft group chose the theme for the decorations on our entry for the Adderbury Christmas Tree Festival, using waste and found materials. This proved an excellent choice as our tree won the most votes in the Community section. 

Although the majority of votes at our February Members’ meeting in 2022 went to Appropriate Sentencing for Non-violent Women Offenders, the Resolution proposed for voting at the NFWI Annual Meeting concerned the under-diagnosis of autism and ADHD in girls and women. At our May meeting when we discussed this Resolution, members felt that it was not well drafted and lacked any criteria for assessing its impact.We voted against its adoption. However, this Resolution was adopted at the NFWI Annual Meeting.

The Resolution which attracted the most votes at our meeting in January 2021 was a Call to Increase Awareness of the Subtle Signs of Ovarian Cancer and this was the Resolution adopted at the NFWI Annual Meeting.

At our January 2020 meeting Ending Modern Slavery received the most votes. This, together with Call to Increase Potential Stem Cell Registration was adopted by NFWI for 2020/21. Pandemic restrictions meant that we were unable to act locally on the Resolution.

In 2019 two Resolutions were carried at the NFWI Annual Meeting, one aimed at stopping the decline in rural bus services and the second responding to the falling take up of the smear test for cervical cancer..

If you would like to get involved in any of the campaigns, please contact us.