Originally published 6 November 2007. This article is retained from the tCI archive. Law, policy or practice may have changed since publication.
In England, the Local Government Minister has thrown a substantial grenade towards a large number of Councils by announcing nine successful bids for Unitary status, and thereby sealing the fate of over 30 District Councils. The creation of new Unitary Authorities for Cornwall, Durham, Northumberland, Shropshire, Wiltshire, Ipswich and Exeter will delight many who see the two-tier system as confusing and wasteful. Rather more complicated plans to carve up Bedfordshire and Cheshire will irritate many who thought these areas already well administered. But in all these areas, whatever we think of the merits of the case - one thing is certain, they face a tremendous upheaval.
What are the implications for consultation and public engagement? There are four risks that can be easily identified: 1. Disillusioned elected members of Councils that will disappear will not feel motivated to deal with public concerns, and will just refer citizens and stakeholders to new bodies that have not yet been formally established.
2. Talented officers, facing job insecurity, will leave and may not be replaced; relationships they have nurtured with local groups may suffer as a result 3. Existing machinery for on-going consultation (eg consultative committees, forums, panels etc) will lose focus as fewer of the issues discussed remain within the competence of the host Council to address 4. Stakeholder bodies will see little point in building relationships and conducting a dialogue with Councils and officers who may not be around in future.
None of these are insurmountable, and we think there are ways to minimise the problems. It may be possible, for example, using Local Strategic Partnerships to strengthen the consultation framework for the new Unitaries well in advance of the changeover; arguably many of the community and business groups involved have a contribution to make on the creation of these new Authorities. If ever there was a case for immediately starting work on the White Paper’s recommended Comprehensive Engagement Strategies - this is it.
But the issue is much wider than English local government’s latest convulsions. Every time there is a big re-organisation, public engagement programmes are badly affected. The rationalisation of NHS Trusts and Strategic Health Authorities two years ago led to a hiatus, as posts took months to fill and, in places, no-one knew who was in charge of consultation. Had the Police forces amalgamated, no doubt there could have been similar situations. No wonder citizens and community groups feel disenfranchised; they are encouraged to enter into dialogue, and suddenly there’s no-one there - they’ve been re-organised.
Every large organisation is prone to bursts of re-organisation and they sometimes underestimate the true cost of such disruption. Whilst change cannot be avoided, we need to get better at assessing the impact of such instability, and we need to be better at planning ways to handle the inevitable challenges.
In fact, it is possible to harness this period to improve consultation. In the case of the new Unitary Councils, here is an opportunity to establish ways of working that will be better than what has taken place in the past. There may be many community groups and maybe seldom-heard sections of society that lack the resources to engage with six District Councils, and may be glad of a single point of contact over a wider area. Or consultation techniques which were not viable to date might become affordable and useful in the new arrangements. Both Citizens Panels and e-consultation tools fall into this category.
What is important is not to lose time, nor lose people’s commitment to dialogue. Put someone in charge of the transition who can keep people on all sides of the dialogue full motivated and this will make a big difference. Trigger points
- How well does your organisation manage change or re-organisation? Is someone responsible for maintaining effective dialogue throughout?
- Always maintain a relationship contact with consultees; never let a delay in making appointment be an excuse to deny them a contact point.
- Watch for the Institute’s forthcoming Briefing paper on Managing Consultation Blight during Organisational transition, and consider our Comprehensive Engagement Strategies course.
This is the91st 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