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That is the old petition, they have already responded. We need a new petition.

Not been considered for debate yet. The response was triggered by 10,000 votes.

(Is it not 100,000?)

Genuine question - has anything ever happened as a result of these petitions? When it has been debated, has there been a meaningful change afterwards?

No, nothing has happened. 100,000 signatures means it's considered for debate, not guaranteed. The response is inevitably:

"We have considered debating this and decided actually we don't fancy it. Keep signing the petitions though, they definitely make a difference and don't think about taking direct action of any form."

In some cases ("pasty tax" and stuff like that), popular petitions added pressure to the pile that eventually forced policy U-turns. On their own they are pretty useless.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com