Consulting the Unresponsive - There is much to consider when assessing the views of the silent majority

For those whose lot it is to consult the public at large – rather than identifiable stakeholder organisations, there has always been a nagging issue. How do we know that those who have responded to us mirror the views of those that didn’t? In other words, what about the silent majority?

Professional market researchers can, of course explain their confidence levels in different samples – but the fact remains that many public sector consultations rely on postal surveys or other self-selected responses. Only rarely do consultors organise a structurally-sampled reference group against which to benchmark the results. So, for whatever reason, there are many who cannot be absolutely sure they can read the minds of the community as a whole. Take, for example the new generation of NHS Foundation Trusts. In a bold experiment at a new form of accountability, some of them have around 20,000 members; in total 1.3 million people have joined their local Trust. These are unprecedented levels of community engagement, and hold the prospect of imaginative ways of involving substantial numbers in the coming years.

But it is worth remembering that these figures still only amount to 5% of the population. And they are not very representative, tending towards the over-representation of older people, and those who have suffered chronic illness. They can vote for Trust Governors but how many of these will feel able and willing to participate in other activities remains to be seen. Let’s be optimistic and assume about half. And let’s also assume, just for the sake of argument that they do not take part in parallel consultative machinery such as LINks. We’re left with 2.5% - almost exactly the percentage of the citizenry which the MORI/Audit Commission study of 2006/2007 regarded as being “citizen activists”

So what about the other 97.5%? The same study claims that between 25% and 40% of people are more than by-standers and will become fully involved if and when life events gives them reason to engage with public bodies. Such people will dip in and dip out of civic engagement. But it still leaves us with about half the population who just want service providers to get on with it.

Within this group however, there are certainly those who will volunteer their views if asked. And it may well be that their opinions can make a difference. We know, for example that there are huge numbers of migrants or others with limited English or those with modest literacy skills for whom documentary or survey-based methods are inappropriate. Using more inclusive methods and taking the dialogue out onto the streets, into the pubs and shopping centres ....and into the schools will help us build a more comprehensive picture.

In the meantime there is more we can do with existing mechanisms. We have Citizens panels in many Councils, and by sharing them with other agencies, can attract more people to them. Where they are structured samples, there is an opportunity to gain a more representative set of opinions – but that only works if the dialogue methods avoid counting only the self-selected. With the Sustainable Communities Act requiring ideas generated in the community to be examined by a panel of citizens, we back once again scratching our heads and wondering what the silent majority would choose......

There may be many reasons for an indifference to the work of public bodies in the UK, and no-one is proposing coercion to force people to a reluctant participation. But consultors have available to them a range of techniques that can reach beyond the usual suspects, and go some way to understanding what the rest may think. Trigger points

• Look at your response rates to traditional surveys – and consider whether there might be better ways to obtain a broader sample
• Focus on the profile of respondents in any consultation – and compare it with the overall demographics
• Re-motivate or re-build your Citizens Panel; consider booking for Panels 4 - the Institute’s 4th Annual Conference on Citizen and Community Panels, Birmingham.

This is the 120th Tuesday Topic; a full list of subjects covered is available for Institute members and is a valuable resource covering so many aspects of consultation and engagement