CND launched its new campaign to report the UK to the UN this week, and it’s vital we get our message out there. One very good way of doing this is through producing a press release and sending it to your local paper(s).
For an effective press release for your CND group, you need five main elements: a top line summarising the story, background, quotes, contact details and (ideally) pictures.
Your press release will be most effective if it’s timed to the publication schedule of the paper you’re trying to reach.
CND has prepared the below as a model for groups to use if they find helpful, but feel free to make your own changes. We’ve also included a quote you can use from our General Secretary, Kate Hudson:
X-day Xth July
Press release
[CND Group Contact Name] [Contact Telephone] [Contact E-mail Address]
For immediate release
UK government to be reported to the United Nations for breaking international law by [Your Local CND group]
[Your local CND group] is supporting the campaign launched on Monday to report the UK government to the United Nations for breaking international law.
Over the next month, we will be encouraging local people to add their name to a CND petition which will be submitted to the United Nations in August.
In March, Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced the UK would lift the cap on its arsenal of nuclear warheads, increasing them by up to 40%. This is the first increase in UK nuclear weapons since the end of the Cold War and is expected to cost tens of billions of pounds.
CND wants the dangerous increase in nuclear weapons cancelled and the money redirected to doctors, hospitals and the NHS.
A CND legal opinion found that this is in breach of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, of which the UK has been a member for more than fifty years.
[Contact from your local CND group] said:
In your quote, you want to explain how people can get involved locally. It is also well worth relating the tens of billions of pounds being spent on the new weapons to any local spending cuts your area is facing, particularly to do with the NHS.
Some points to make might be:
- The Government wants to give nurses a mere 1% pay rise to nurses who’ve worked through the pandemic.
- The Government has pledged just $744 million to efforts to vaccinate the poorest countries and people in the world. The increase in nuclear warheads is likely to cost several times this.
- The warhead increase runs against the trends of international policy, as negotiations on restoring the Iran nuclear deal continue and the U.S.A and Russia discuss reducing their own nuclear arsenals.
- Boris Johnson is following a Donald Trump policy, with no respect for international law or international institutions.
Kate Hudson, CND General Secretary, said:
‘It’s a fact: the Government is in breach of international law by increasing the UK’s nuclear arsenal by over 40%. So it’s no surprise that there has been widespread international condemnation of this move – some say its starting a new nuclear arms race.
People up and down the country have been outraged by this decision: it reverses thirty years of gradual nuclear reductions and makes us all less safe. CND wants to give a voice to that anger by allowing people to demand international action.
Britain is behaving like a rogue state and we need the UN to intervene and uphold international law.’
ENDS