[stephen_g]

The same kind of thing has always happened when I’ve sent emails to my MP (in Australia). Just basically a form letter with my name inserted at the top. I expect what happens is one of their staff just skims it, sends the form reply and deletes it…

[denton-scratch]

My half-sister was private secretary to a senior MP. They all hate dealing with letters from constituents.

I've emailed my MP several times; I've always had a considered (written) response. Evasive, maybe; they don't want to give hostages to fortune. But they were all evidently read; and in one case, the MP forwarded my message to the Foreign Secretary for comment.

My understanding is that (in the UK, at least) writing to them is one of the most effective ways of influencing them, because the proportion of voters who write in is tiny.

[ryandrake]

Maybe it is different in the UK, but in the USA, writing a representative is pointless. A letter from a voter or even a huge pile of letters is not going to change that representative's vote. We basically elect automations who are 100% going to vote a certain way on each issue. A representative is basically an immutable associative array of issue->vote that we add to the legislative algorithm on election day. The time to affect legislation you don't want is on election day. Once your district's particular array is in the algorithm, it is pretty much const until the next election.

[kelipso]

Same thing happens in the US. If you actually call them, the intern who picks up is basically there just so people can shout at them, it doesn't go to anyone else and you don't even get a form letter.

[potatochup]

I complained to one of my local NZ MPs about how the anti-spam legislation was ineffective since it's ambiguous. I got a polite response detailing how legislation is usually crafted that way and then left to the courts to decide what constitutes "consent for marketing communications", with some links to various case law decisions. I disagree in principle but I really appreciated the detailed response.

[ipaddr]

Ever try posting your comments and the reply you got on twitter?