Consultation is increasingly a bit of a sham. Yet democracy relies on it. The deeply held notion in some areas of public policy that consultation is in itself a problem is obviously a barrier, but there’s plenty been written on participation myths and I ain’t gonna expunge any here. But here’s a thought. To my mind too few, politicians and the public, appreciate the difference between gauging public opinion and gathering information that helps improve public policy decision-making.
In the latter the quality of opinions is more important than quantity. The role of the latter is much wider ranging and useful in developing policy than the former, which typically results in the unsatisfactory polarisation of opinion. Some like the simple duality of binary decisions: the ayes have it. But public policy is more often nuanced, and is not about creating winners and losers. It involves careful balancing of public and private interests, the weighing up of risks, social and environmental impact, costs and benefits, and mitigation of negative impacts and increasingly important identifying possible unintended consequences (the known unknowns).
I suppose it doesn’t help that today we have increasingly low barriers to entry. There’s a proliferation of amateur practitioners, who hold no particular qualifications bar a computer, email or website and a clip board. DIY consultations and the “have a go” lot are well meaning, but can be a menace – you have been warned. But more insidious still is that band that simply use consultation as a fig leaf.
Now, to my mind poor consultation is probably worse than no consultation at all, as it can really cloud sensible debate e.g. confusing voting on options when you’re actually information gathering, or the information gathered is no more representative than asking randomers in the street. But my favourite pet hates are: the premeditated consultation that is used to rubber stamp a proposal, regardless of the weight or quality of the views – the odds have been fixed and they are going to do exactly was they please; the sterile consultation, like consulting publicly on term dates, which is an utterly pointless waste of time and taxpayers money. We can save money by not bothering with the latter, but rooting out the former is more difficult, as this is often rooted in some statutory process, which encourages notional compliance.
So, when ELC opened up eastlothianconsultions.co.uk I was not exactly holding my breath, but I figured this was not a bad place to start. Today I am not so sure. The We Asked, You Said, We did section is only complete for a handful of consultations. So I decided to do my own for the recent Dunbar TRO, as ever with tongue slightly in cheek.
