AC2.1 Compare campaigns for change
What is a campaign?
Sometimes members of society want change, whether it be law or not. To promote and encourage
this change, people can create campaigns on the issue.
Campaigns to change a policy
Campaigns that are dedicated to changing a particular policy are often directed at political parties.
Example:
Marcus Rashford’s free school meals.
Aim and purpose:
Marcus Rashford is a footballer who made a campaign to provide more funding for children who
require free-school meals during the school holidays where children may struggle to eat because
they cannot afford it and rely on school during term time. This focused mostly on those who had
been hit hard by the COVID 19 pandemic and were struggling financially. Rashford gave pressure to
the government and encouraged people to contact their local MP’S with the hashtag #writenow in
an attempt to feed the nation's children. By influencing parliament through Rashford’s pressure itself
and pressure from people at large as he attempted to encourage them to contact local MP’s,
Rashford attempted to change the policy regarding free school meals with children.
Cause of the campaign:
Marcus Rashford began his campaign for children’s free school meals because of his own childhood,
which he touched on during his campaign, mentioning that he grew up with parents who were
unable to afford every meal, and many would be skipped.
Support given:
Rashford had a large fanbase prior to the campaign and this meant that many of his fans supported
his campaign when it arose. Manchester United fans, footballs fan in general and then young kids.
Methods:
Rashford partnered with FareShare, a charity aimed at tackling food poverty, to promote his
campaign and launched the Child Poverty Taskforce, which is a group of 15 organisations which
FareShare partners with, as well as promoting it on social media and sharing his campaign with his
millions of followers he gained from being a well-known footballer. Rashford also attracted media
attention and his campaign was shared among many forms of media including social media and
television programmes that are watched by millions such as BBC news. Rashford started two
hashtags, one being #writenow which promoted the idea of the public contacting their local
members of parliament and enquiring about the meals, and #maketheuturn which campaigned for a
voucher scheme which was a replacement for the free school meals children got in term time. These
trended on social media and promoted his campaign, mostly on the popular platform Twitter. This
, campaign began in October 2020 and continues to be a significant campaign, providing meals for
children in impoverished families across the UK.
Target audience:
Rashford targeted anybody old enough to contact parliament and make change in the UK that he
could reach through the news and social media. He encouraged anybody he reached to contact their
local MP’s and fight for the change in policy for the free school meals. The campaign was geared
towards helping those in poverty who cannot afford meals during school holidays.
Key characters:
Marcus Rashford & FareShare
Successes:
Rashford’s campaign was extremely successful and saw millions of donations across the UK towards
relieving food poverty, and the hashtags he started trended across many different social media
platforms such as Twitter and TikTok which were gaining popularity at the time. This raised enough
money to provide meals for 21 million meals for families that are struggling across the UK. After the
campaign, a winter package was bought in by the government to provide food relief from Winter
2020 until Easter 2021. Marcus raised large awareness of child hunger poverty in the UK and
attracted vast amounts of media attention which led to the providing 21 million meals.
Impact:
National in England and Wales.
Areas for improvement:
Rashford’s campaign lack’s fault to improve on. Rashford could easily reach a large audience and
influence people because he was a celebrity of high status as he was a well-known footballer, and his
campaign was simple and memorable, as well as becoming trending and extremely popular.
Campaigns to change a law
Some campaigners may feel that an existing law requires area of change and will therefore campaign
against it.
Example:
Sarah’s law.
Aim and purpose:
Sarah’s law is a campaign created by Sarah Payne’s mother, Sara Payne, making information
available to the public about known convicted child sex offenders in local areas if a member of the
public was to ask the police. This came as a result of the abduction of then eight-year-old Sarah
Payne, who after several days of search when she went missing in July 2000, was found buried in a
field. Sarah Payne was murdered by a convicted paedophile who lived in the area she went missing
in.
Cause of the campaign:
What is a campaign?
Sometimes members of society want change, whether it be law or not. To promote and encourage
this change, people can create campaigns on the issue.
Campaigns to change a policy
Campaigns that are dedicated to changing a particular policy are often directed at political parties.
Example:
Marcus Rashford’s free school meals.
Aim and purpose:
Marcus Rashford is a footballer who made a campaign to provide more funding for children who
require free-school meals during the school holidays where children may struggle to eat because
they cannot afford it and rely on school during term time. This focused mostly on those who had
been hit hard by the COVID 19 pandemic and were struggling financially. Rashford gave pressure to
the government and encouraged people to contact their local MP’S with the hashtag #writenow in
an attempt to feed the nation's children. By influencing parliament through Rashford’s pressure itself
and pressure from people at large as he attempted to encourage them to contact local MP’s,
Rashford attempted to change the policy regarding free school meals with children.
Cause of the campaign:
Marcus Rashford began his campaign for children’s free school meals because of his own childhood,
which he touched on during his campaign, mentioning that he grew up with parents who were
unable to afford every meal, and many would be skipped.
Support given:
Rashford had a large fanbase prior to the campaign and this meant that many of his fans supported
his campaign when it arose. Manchester United fans, footballs fan in general and then young kids.
Methods:
Rashford partnered with FareShare, a charity aimed at tackling food poverty, to promote his
campaign and launched the Child Poverty Taskforce, which is a group of 15 organisations which
FareShare partners with, as well as promoting it on social media and sharing his campaign with his
millions of followers he gained from being a well-known footballer. Rashford also attracted media
attention and his campaign was shared among many forms of media including social media and
television programmes that are watched by millions such as BBC news. Rashford started two
hashtags, one being #writenow which promoted the idea of the public contacting their local
members of parliament and enquiring about the meals, and #maketheuturn which campaigned for a
voucher scheme which was a replacement for the free school meals children got in term time. These
trended on social media and promoted his campaign, mostly on the popular platform Twitter. This
, campaign began in October 2020 and continues to be a significant campaign, providing meals for
children in impoverished families across the UK.
Target audience:
Rashford targeted anybody old enough to contact parliament and make change in the UK that he
could reach through the news and social media. He encouraged anybody he reached to contact their
local MP’s and fight for the change in policy for the free school meals. The campaign was geared
towards helping those in poverty who cannot afford meals during school holidays.
Key characters:
Marcus Rashford & FareShare
Successes:
Rashford’s campaign was extremely successful and saw millions of donations across the UK towards
relieving food poverty, and the hashtags he started trended across many different social media
platforms such as Twitter and TikTok which were gaining popularity at the time. This raised enough
money to provide meals for 21 million meals for families that are struggling across the UK. After the
campaign, a winter package was bought in by the government to provide food relief from Winter
2020 until Easter 2021. Marcus raised large awareness of child hunger poverty in the UK and
attracted vast amounts of media attention which led to the providing 21 million meals.
Impact:
National in England and Wales.
Areas for improvement:
Rashford’s campaign lack’s fault to improve on. Rashford could easily reach a large audience and
influence people because he was a celebrity of high status as he was a well-known footballer, and his
campaign was simple and memorable, as well as becoming trending and extremely popular.
Campaigns to change a law
Some campaigners may feel that an existing law requires area of change and will therefore campaign
against it.
Example:
Sarah’s law.
Aim and purpose:
Sarah’s law is a campaign created by Sarah Payne’s mother, Sara Payne, making information
available to the public about known convicted child sex offenders in local areas if a member of the
public was to ask the police. This came as a result of the abduction of then eight-year-old Sarah
Payne, who after several days of search when she went missing in July 2000, was found buried in a
field. Sarah Payne was murdered by a convicted paedophile who lived in the area she went missing
in.
Cause of the campaign: