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Saturday, 26 May 2012

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Government, citizens and rights

The government's consultation process explained

Consultation - involving the public in the work of government - has become an integral part of the policy-making process. Every year hundreds of consultations are launched at all levels of government.

Consultation is about making government more open and policies more effective by listening to and taking on-board views of the public and interested groups.

Listening to the public has a number of specific benefits. It:

allows the government to tap the widest source of information possible and improve the quality of decisions reached
alerts policy makers to any concerns and issues not picked up
helps to monitor existing policy in order to see whether or not changes are needed

All consultations follow the Cabinet Office's code of practice. This helps ensure that a common standard for consulting the public exists across government. When the government consults it must:

build a realistic timeframe for the consultation
be clear whom is being consulted, about what and for what purpose
ensure the document is as simple and concise as possible. It should include a summary and clearly set out questions to address
always distribute documents as widely as possible, also using electronic means
make sure that all responses are carefully and open-mindedly analysed and the results made widely available. It must also give reasons for final decisions