Invite politicians to join your glow ride

Politicians love a photo opportunity, and inviting them to your event can be a good way to help them understand some of the issues that matter for cycling.

You might want to invite local councillors, your MP in England, or constituency MS, MSP or MLA if you live in Wales, Scotland or Northern Ireland. You can find their contact details using Write To Them.

Politicians receive a lot of correspondence, so make your message brief, polite and locally relevant. Make sure your event details are obvious at the top.

Bear in mind that they might not own a bike or may not have cycled for many years, so it's good to offer an alternative way to meet another day.

You can copy our suggested text below or download it as a word document, and then adapt it to paste into your email.

Subject: Invitation to join Glow Ride event on [date]

Dear [name of politician],

I’m a constituent in [name of constituency] and part of the [name of group] group. We are organising a glow ride event in a few weeks’ time, and it would be wonderful if you were able to attend.

• Date:
• Time: [include start and end time]
• Location:
• More information: [add link]

This mass ride is part of a night of action for Cycling UK’s ‘My ride. Our right’ campaign, which aims to make cycling feel safer for women. 

Surveys show that women are more likely than men to be put off cycling by concerns about busy traffic, and more likely to say that direct, separated cycle routes would encourage them to cycle.

[Add a couple of specific local sentences, such as: I know from speaking to friends in Guildford that the high levels of traffic are off-putting, and good-quality routes like the one along the A25 by Stoke Park can make a huge difference to people’s confidence, especially for women.]

With this ride, we aim to light up the night and show support for safer streets and better cycle routes in [town], especially for women riding after dark.

I understand that this event is outside usual working hours and so if you would rather protect your evening time, we’d be happy to meet at another time to take a walk around some of the locations which could be improved for cycling.

I look forward to hearing from you.

Kind regards,

[Your name]

[Name of group]

[Your email address]

[Your address and postcode - to show you are a constituent]