I just received the following email from Steve Sutherland from Dortech, the guy who started the glass petition:
First of all a big thank you for supporting this petition. The petition now has more than 500 signatures and I am pleased to say that Glass wire news has now also publicised the petition.
There are 4,760 petitions registered on the downing street web site, and our petition is now in the top 200 – still some way to go, but never the less, it is developing nicely. If you have not signed up to the petition, can I ask you to reconsider doing so, and if you can encourage others to also sign up, it would be very much appreciated.
Thank you once again for your support, hopefully we can get the message over to the dominant glass suppliers that they cannot ignore their direct and indirect customers and that they are not immune to the market forces that we all have to deal with. Announcing, price increases of up to 50% on their products, in the current market will have a detrimental effect not only on independent businesses but also on the entire market.
Personally, I think the response is disappointing.
On this site, 90% of people have agreed that an illegal glass cartel is still operating in this industry, despite being recently fined by the European Commission.
How many people work in the double glazing industry? There must be tens of thousands of people associated with the industry in some way, and the actions of the major glass suppliers will have a negative impact on us all.
There really should be thousands of people signing the petition, not hundreds. There can only be two reasons for the small number of signatures:
Firstly, apathy has set in, and people can’t be bothered. In which case then the glass suppliers get their way, and as an industry we deserve to be bullied like this.
Or secondly, people don’t know about the petition. If this is the case, then I recommend all my readers to tell their work colleagues about the petition. Send them an email explaining the problem, and give them the following link:
http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/Glass-prices/
Thank You
