When the Government cancelled the Forestry consultation earlier this year, the Prime Minister is reported to have complained that ‘we hadn’t done enough pitch-rolling’. Despite mystifying non-cricket followers, he was probably spot-on.

The road to consultation has two distinct aspects – procedural and substantive. Organisers of consultations these days are quite familiar with the necessary preparations for such a formal engagement exercise. We normally refer to the procedural elements as pre-consultation, and expect it to cover discussions with key stakeholders about the form the dialogue should take – methods, venues, timings and so forth; expect these to take place in the weeks and months leading to the start of the consultation period.