[cma-l] Appeal to all Station Managers / Project Leaders

[Stevensuttie at aol.com]

I'm writing to send round my sincere apologies for my message I sent  
yesterday as, for many, it's not been read in the way it was originally  
intended. It was supposed to work as a rallying cry - and to be a  little bit tongue 
in cheek as well...(feel free to mock me, xxx,  etc) 
 
But I did want it to be provocative to those who haven't signed  or 
circulated the petition. It was filled with frustration and irritation that 6  
weeks of non-stop communications has resulted in very few people signing it,  
especially considering how big the sector is.
 
That's what my e-mail was about. No more, no less. And yes, it served  a 
purpose of attracting another 150 signatures since the CMA published it.  
That's roughly a 6% increase in numbers. 
 
I have had several supportive messages from colleagues who can see what I  
was trying to achieve. I also had one from Bill Best who has inherited a 
massive  amount of extra work because of my ill-fated rally cry! Sorry again 
Bill.
 
But hate my prose or love it - this petition is going to do more damage to  
our sector than good if this poor turnout remains.  What do those  numbers 
tell the Government?  That it's not important.  This was  told to me 4 weeks 
ago by our President Ian Stewart MP - Chair of the all party  parliamentary 
community media group. And, as Ian asked me to do "what I  can" to help 
boost these numbers - I have had this additional task of trying to  get as many 
names signed up as possible - by getting those people that we all  see in 
our radio stations every single day on board and signed up. 
 
I have gone about this task in good humour, along with Karl Hartland and  
Steve Buckley -  and spent many hours and days on the phone  talking to 
station managers across the country, I've tried hard and I feel like  I've done 
my bit.
 
I apologise whole heartedly to those colleagues who took offence at my  
appeal.
 
I will add one last word - please don't let my email get in the way of  the 
issue which is that we need to support this petition and make sure the  
Government understands just how important, and how big we are. We currently 
look  quite insignificant, according to this petition. And that's my major  
concern.
 
Kindest  Regards
Steve Suttie
Station Manager, 94.4FM Salford City  Radio
office 0161 793 2939 
mobile 07772 355  852
WINNERS - Community Award - Salford  Business Awards 2009
Support Community Radio - SIGN THE  PETITION:  _http://allthevoices.org_ 
(http://allthevoices.org)  
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.commedia.org.uk/pipermail/cma-l/attachments/20090903/47dae62a/attachment.html>