This is what you said in our Member Survey 2023:
Uplift gives ordinary people across Ireland the opportunity to work together to make an extraordinary difference in so many ways.
We come from different walks of life and experience life in different ways – but what brings us together is our belief that with our collective people-power, we can make Ireland a better place for everyone living here, no matter who they are.
More than 600 of us shared what we thought was important to us about the year ahead. Here is a snapshot of what we said we want our community to campaign on this year.
- Our top priorities are protecting renters and campaigning for more public homes
- Getting toxic chemicals out of our food and water
- Improving our public transport
- Taking action to stop racism and hate
We step up to make a real difference in the things our community cares about.
Those are the issues we said we wanted to campaign on, but our community also said how we should go about winning together. More than anything, members know that together we are powerful, we connect over shared values and our strength is our people power.
We want to make sure politicians feel the heat on issues we care about. As well as holding politicians accountable, we want to use our consumer power to force companies and services to behave better – especially banks, shops, and energy providers. Partnering with communities affected by injustice was also voted a top priority.
There are many ways in which we are good allies to those who are suffering. We stand in solidarity with survivors of violence and those affected by disasters, we support groups taking on racism and who are disadvantaged by the cruel immigration system – including Direct Provision. We show solidarity with the Traveller community, LGBTQ+ people, and all communities fighting against the injustices and discrimination they face in their daily lives.
There’s a huge appetite in our community for more local campaigning and for getting better at spreading the news about the things we care about across social media and through WhatsApp. Campaigns like better public transport, 24/7 mental health services, helping students have a better experience in school and college, protecting renters, and stopping toxic glyphosate from getting into our food and water are just some of the many things that local campaigns can be powerful.
Uplift members face many challenges as individuals, in their families and communities.
Many people in our community need to access regular healthcare and especially struggle to access 24/7 mental health support. Surviving on a low income is a shared experience for many members – in low-paid work, unpaid care work, and welfare-dependent, older people living on a small pension. A number of Uplift members have experienced violence, abuse, racism, and hate in their daily lives.
We care about each other & believe we are stronger together.
As a community, we know the importance of standing with each other and said we are prepared to put our skills, knowledge, money, and time to work for an Ireland that’s fair, equal, and just.
Right now, there are more than 320,000 of us connected by our people-powered community. Uplift members work in local communities: providing important services and supporting communities to stand up for themselves. There are members living in Direct Provision centres in cities on isolated islands and in rural areas. Many of us are retired, accountants, artists, farmers, teachers, students, and healthcare professionals. We come from all walks of life – but we share values.
Uplift members have so much talent, knowledge and determination to share. What connects us all is that we care about the communities we live in and want them to be safer and happier places to live in. We also deeply care about getting to the root causes of the many challenges and difficulties we see around us. We want to push hard for better decisions, laws and policies. We also want to focus on reining in the power of corporations and big business.
Uplift members come from all walks of life, which makes our movement stronger and more diverse. We want to run stronger and bigger campaigns, so raising more member donations is important to be able to do that.
Uplift doesn’t get money from big corporations, political parties, or government – our community is powered by individual donations from thousands of ordinary people like you who chip in a bit every month, or when we have to pay for something to support a campaign.
This funding model gives us the independence to stand up to powerful decision-makers – without having to worry about falling in line. It also means that sometimes we have to rattle the can and ask each other to chip in every so often to be able to keep going.
Monthly donations from members count for so much: If donations are spread over a year we can plan ahead for campaigns knowing we have the resources to carry out and win on issues that matter to our community.
Without you, we wouldn’t be able to pull off all the things we do together, so fair play.
Chip in monthly to support Uplift campaigns
More power to us all.
