Shelter: high-impact personalised email to MP action

The Renters’ Rights Bill marks a major milestone in Shelter’s long standing campaign for better protection for private renters in England and Wales. But the proposed legislation introduced to Parliament fell short on some of Shelter’s key target areas. 

The Bill’s ‘Second Reading’ in October 2024 was the first opportunity to debate it in the House of Commons, and an important opportunity to raise concerns and propose amendments. Shelter’s innovative email-to-target action offered supporters the chance to choose which key issue to highlight, and straightforward ways to personalise the email to catch the attention of busy MPs and their staff. 

Personalised campaigning: choose your topic

Shelter wanted to raise three areas where the Bill needed to be stronger: discrimination in renting, security for renters and unfair rent increases. Supporters could choose which issue was most important to them, and were then offered draft email copy highlighting that topic. There was also an option for people who wanted to raise all three issues. 

Tailored and personalised messages

Supporters could indicate whether they were, themselves, a private renter. If they ticked ‘yes’, this information would be added automatically to their draft email.  They were also given a chance to add a short statement on why this issue particularly mattered to them, which was then dropped into the draft email, adding a rich, personal angle to the message.  

The supporter’s town was added to the subject line of the email, and the name of the constituency referenced in the email text so that the MP or their caseworker would be able to see immediately that this was a message from a constituent. 

Delivering campaign impact

There was only a short window for action, but Shelter supporters wrote over 2,800 emails to their MPs in advance of the crucial debate. 

More importantly, the emails had a real effect. MPs spoke in favour of the amendments that Shelter wanted to see, directly quoted the stories that supporters sent them, and referenced the information and statistics that had been in the Shelter briefing linked from the email. The campaign was mentioned more than ten times in the debate. Unfair rent increases were mentioned 44 times by 21 different MPs, and ending section 21 'no fault' evictions was endorsed throughout the debate. Ministers were keen to discuss ending the discriminatory practice of requiring rent in advance. 

The Bill has now passed through the Bill committee and it is expected that it'll be back in the House of Commons for its third reading and report stage early in 2025. Ahead of this, Shelter is campaigning to make sure key amendments, which have been laid by MPs, will get the support required to become part of the Bill. 

You can find out more about Shelter’s campaign for better Renters’ Rights here.

"At the second reading debate we saw some great results from this action, with high-profile MPs standing up and quoting the stories our supporters shared with them. We know that we've helped stretch the terms of the debate and put new policy issues on the table as we head into the latter stages of the Bill progressing through Parliament.

"Giving supporters the option to choose what they wanted to email their MP about was great for us and the supporters. It gave us additional information on the policy areas our supporters were most interested in, which has allowed us to improve our supporter communication so we can become better at engaging and driving action. And supporters had a chance to contact their MP about the issues which matter most to them, and indicate if they were private renters themselves. This meant the MPs received more personalised emails rather than multiple identical emails from Shelter supporters."
James Austin, Campaigner, Shelter