Pressure Groups

Recently I heard one pundit on the BBC comment that No.10s ePetition system was a bit of an own goal, as it was dominated by pressure groups. I don't see this as a bad thing. After all, political party members can use it too. As can labour unions, charities, rail customers, cancer victims, super heroes or newspaper campaigns, to name but a few. Surely the essence of democracy is expressing your opinion to enhance the debate.

Sure, the ePetition system is more open to abuse than the proposed Interactive Democracy system, by people using aliases to boost the numbers of signatures (an address is required, but is it checked?). But I applaud No.10 for providing this service. It's an experiment that Interactive Democracy can learn from.