Originally published 8 February 2011. This article is retained from the tCI archive. Law, policy or practice may have changed since publication.
By our calculations, the Central Government has launched 80 consultations in its five months of office. These are in addition to its high-profile request for ideas on the deficit-reduction.
Given where the administration lies in the policy-making cycle, and that these figures exclude major high-profile reviews kicked off in the Coalition Agreement, this appears a reassuringly high figure. It confirms that whatever the messages Ministers have wished to send to Councils, Quangos and other public bodies, when it comes to their own Departments, consultation remains a vital process, and is being conducted in large numbers.
| Whitehall Department | No of consultations (number >12 weeks) |
|---|---|
| Business & Industry | 8 (4) |
| Communities & Local Government | 9 (6) |
| Culture Media & Sport | 3 (1) |
| Education | 6 (3) |
| Environment & Climate Change | 7 (2) |
| Equalities Office | 1 (1) |
| Health | 9 (7) |
| HM Treasury | 3 (2) |
| Home Office | 7 (3) |
| Justice | 4 (3) |
| Transport | 7 (2) |
| Work & Pensions | 8 (2) |
| Total | 80 (36) |
And rightly so!
Engaging with stakeholders is a pre-requisite for successful change management. Civil Servants often recognise this, but are under terrific pressure to sanity-check new policy initiatives ... and quickly. For issues likely to feature in the Autumn legislative programme, the accelerator pedal has been pressed hard ... so the well-established 12-week rule has gone by the board.
As shown in the table fewer than half (45%) the consultations announced since June have been for the 12 weeks prescribed by the (previous) Government Code of Practice. In contrast, the comparable figure for Scotland’s 46 consultations is 67%; for Wales’ 50 consultations it is 72% and for Northern Ireland’s 58 consultations it is 69%.
The Institute has never been over-exercised about the length of consultations – though we concede that it is of great importance to many consultees – especially the voluntary and community sector which is often short of resources and need time to engage with their own members. Indeed when the Code of Practice was reviewed and revised in 2007, we urged upon Ministers the idea of a fast-track process especially for those occasions when speed is of the essence, and with the increasing capability of eConsultation enabling many consultees to respond quickly.
Some Government departments have been open about the need for speed.
- The Home Office consultation on Re-balancing the Licensing Act lasted 6 weeks from July to September, with the Department insisting that it had already consulted a number of key partners prior to this exercise and including “8 meetings with over 55 stakeholders from the on and off trade, alcohol producers, police and local authorities, health and voluntary sectors”
- The CLG Department allowed 6 weeks for its consultation on Proposed Changes to Guidance on Evaluating the Extent of Rough Sleeping. Its rationale was that this was ‘a technical consultation on statistical outputs’
- The Department of Transport allowed 8 weeks for the consultation on Reimbursement Arrangements for the Concessionary Bus Travel Scheme in England stating that, “This consultation has been shortened to 8 weeks from the usual 12 weeks because of the narrow range of the issues involved, and so that the revised Reimbursement Guidance can be issued in its final form ahead of the 1st December deadline for authorities to publish their statutory schemes for implementation from 1st April 2011”.
- The Ministry of Justice held an 8 week consultation about Guidance on Commercial Organisations Preventing Bribery. It stated that “It is shorter than the standard 12 week period in order to allow enough time for views to be considered and for guidance to be published early in the New Year in advance of the Act coming into force in April 2011”.
These examples show departments trying; sadly others have not even bothered to highlight the anomaly (sometimes whilst simultaneously publishing the Code and its 12 week provision!) But there is clearly a case for looking again at Whitehall’s consultation arrangements.
On a wider issue, Government is clearly signalling that it expects important policy changes to be accompanied by professional engagement with those that are affected. That lesson needs to be heeded by local authorities and others who are tempted to respond to the current financial challenge by avoiding consultation. We can call it the Let’s get on with it! school of decision-making.
Sadly evidence shows that crashing ahead regardless is almost always counter-productive. Better decisions follow proficient consultations. It’s as simple as that!
Trigger points
- What does the consultation programme over the last 5 months look like in your organisation? Is it ‘steady as she goes’, as in Whitehall? Or has consultation gone from ‘boom’ to ‘bust’?
- Does the urgency of the deficit-reduction timetable necessitate shorter timescales?
- Is it time to re-visit the 12 week rule?
- Stay abreast of new developments in consultation by attending Institute courses and events.
This is the 172nd 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