Water charge campaign is best initiative

A CAMPAIGN to save churches and charities from paying for water charges has been named the UK's best public affairs initiative of 2008.

Edinburgh-based reputation management firm Indigo created the "making waves over water charges" campaign for a range of church and charitable groups.

It was set up to fight plans by the Scottish Parliament to end the Water Charge Exemption for charities and churches.

The Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) has now named the campaign, which resulted in one of the largest petitions ever lodged with the Scottish Parliament, as the best in the UK.

Alex Orr, account director at Indigo, said: "Well-executed public affairs work should make things happen and even change outcomes, as happened here.

"Once we made MSPs aware of the seriousness of the situation, a number of motions were lodged in the Scottish Parliament.

With this focus on the issue, after only four months, the campaign group was extremely happy when the Scottish Government announced that it was to retain the exemptions.

"Most important of all, Ministers cited the work of the campaign as a significant influencing factor in its decision."