Motoring Associations seem to be just glorified travel agents and government apologists these days - and expensive ones at that …
I think there is a substantial grey area there - and surely direct and indirect activism has resulted in positive consumer outcomes. I’m not sure I see a problem with this as long as Choice is not seen to be supporting a particular political persuasion in a general sense - rather lobbying for a particular consumer cause, as it has done. I’m sure there will be ebbs and flows in there the boundary for particular things lies, and different seasons in how this is approached and how successfully it plays out - the key will probably be the discretion, judgement and adaptability of the people who are running Choice.
Choice is a not for profit company, and some of us are indeed “voting members” who get Choice Board Briefings, AGM notifications, board nomination information, etc. I’m no expert on corporate structures but the terms business, company, association and club seem on occasion to be used ambiguously - so how this works with Choice in a legal context I’m not entirely sure.
On the subject of the role of Choice in this - it is curious, as we are the (unwilling) product and we are also the consumer of whatever it is social media gives us. As to our privacy, there’s a few vague laws but I think we’d be struggling to find any rights as such … we just like to think we have the right.
