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Campaigning at the V festival


Oxfam van

Rebecca is working for Oxfam as a member of their youth team for four months. She is also the assistant editor of Oxfam's youth website Generation Why.

Rebecca was over the moon when she landed a job campaigning for Oxfam at this year's biggest festivals. Raising awareness has never been more fun.

Oxfam has been a regular feature at big festivals like Glastonbury for years, taking hundreds of volunteers to steward and campaign. This year, Oxfam's youth team is trying out something a bit different.

We are running a funky chill-out tent at the festivals. Our tent is complete with a fair trade café, an ethical t-shirt shop, great music, comfy sofas and games. Along with our tent we have a team of campaigners who go out into the throng of the festival and sign people up for campaigns such as Make Poverty History and Make Trade Fair. Through this we raise awareness about our work and get more people involved in what we do.

I was so pleased to get a place campaigning at V in Stafford. Here is an account of my experience.

The V Festival - Stafford

Before the festival, we were emailed with a campaigner's briefing pack.  It said: 2005 is such an important year in the fight against global poverty, and your contribution to Oxfam's work is invaluable. We are looking forward to having a really high-impact, and fun festival." Exciting stuff. The pack did set my mind at rest. It contained directions, times, contact numbers and a list of things to bring, giving me much less to worry about organisation-wise.

Friday

118 men

I arrived at the festival in Stafford, along with thousands of others, on Friday evening. The sun was shining, the toilets still smelt kind of fresh and there was barely any rubbish on the ground. My first night at V was spent testing out the food and getting to know the 30 or so other campaigners. 

Saturday

An 11 o'clock briefing gave us the all-important campaigning detail. My main role would be to talk to people about Make Trade Fair and encourage people to sign up to the Big Noise Petition, the global petition to make trade fair. By collecting signitures not only would I boost numbers and knowledge about the campaign but I'd also form relationships with new Oxfam convertees. The briefing made it clear that a detailed knowledge about trade wasn't necessary. We were given a good introduction to the issues at the meeting and there were reports available. Moreover, there were experienced Oxfam workers around who would be happy to handle the trickier punters. The campaigners were split into three teams and within these teams we were put into pairs so we were never left to campaign alone. The shift leader would stay in the tent to man the t-shirt stall and be on hand in case any problems arose. We put the finishing touches to the décor in the tent and waited for the hordes to swarm into V, and then into the Oxfam tent.

My team were the first to start campaigning. I was amazed by how eager people were to hear about the campaign. Approaching groups who were sat down chilling out seemed to be the most successful technique. A simple, Hi there, would you be up for signing a petition about making trade fair?" worked well, followed by a chat about the campaign, and more general stuff about how they were enjoying the festival. If they seemed really interested I would talk about Oxfam and stuff they could get involved with. All the hype surrounding Live8 meant that most people knew something about the campaign against poverty, and this made it easier to explain how trade fits into the bigger picture. We then whacked a Make Trade Fair transfer on the hands of willing participants.

In the early evening I helped out in the Oxfam tent. We had a stall with the latest Generation Why t-shirts, wristbands, much sought-after Make Poverty History underpants. This was a good place to talk to people in more detail about Oxfam's work. Chilled-out tunes boomed out into the sunshine and people argued amicably over games of giant Connect 4. Wonderful.  With my work over I headed off to see the bands. A bit of Franz Ferdinand and the Scissor Sisters followed by a campaigners' party in the Oxfam tent finished the day off a treat.

Sunday

Make Trade fair hand

My campaigning was done by four and the rest of the time was mine to make the most of. I lolled around in the still shining sun and listened to the Zutons, Maroon 5 and Kaiser Chiefs. Oasis finished it all off in their own inimitable style. We returned to the Oxfam tent to find out the total of signatures we had managed to get. We had collected a massive 10,000 sign-ups for Make Trade Fair - an incredible achievement. We finished V feeling pretty pleased with our hard work.


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