Consultation with ‘Appointed Voices’ - Phasing out ‘Parent Governors’ might signal the end of a particular form of consultation.

Commentators had predicted for a while that the Government was intent on further reducing – if not eliminating - the role of local authorities in running schools. So it was no great surprise when the Education Secretary, Nicky Morgan announced their wholesale conversion into academies. What was unexpected, though, was dropping the requirement for Parent Governors. A storm of protest predictably followed, and there are rumours of disquiet among Conservative backbenchers. It may therefore be a bit early to mark their demise, and apparently individual schools will still be able to have Parent Governors, if they choose.

This gives us a great opportunity to reflect on those many organisations that have been structured in a particular way, in order for a particular viewpoint to be heard. The role of the Parent Governor, after all, is less to ‘represent’ some or all parents for a school but more to act as a voice around the table capable of looking at issues from a parent’s perspective. An ‘appointed’ voice. It is as if Parliament, back in 1980 worried that the views of parents could not be assured of a hearing unless they were formally included on Governing bodies. Having ‘Parent Governors’ would act as a failsafe and prove better than any requirement upon those bodies to ‘consult’ parents.

Since then the model has been replicated in countless organisations. And when any public body is reorganised, there is always clamour to add some other stakeholder interest to decision-making bodies – very often making them unwieldy and cumbersome. Thirty-six years on and we worry about ‘tokenism’. Individuals selected to sit on Boards are familiar with allegations that they are the ‘token female’, the ‘token BME’ or the ‘token disabled person’. Might there, perhaps be ‘token parents’? If the intention is to use their presence to avoid consulting particular stakeholders – by relying instead on the embedded appointed voice - then the criticism is well placed. But if having such views around the table serves to stimulate genuine engagement with the interests they represent, then all well and good.

There are other models. In the passenger transport world, in the water industry and other regulated environments, use is made of Customer Challenge Groups, or equivalent. These are appointed committees - there to provide a form of assurance that the organisation they monitor are undertaking their engagement and consultation obligations diligently. The degree of independence they have seems a little variable, but here are ‘appointed’ voices – designed to ensure that whole industries are sufficiently ‘listening’. In Wales, Community Health Councils have somehow survived and consist mainly of Ministerial or local authority nominees – appointed as part of the checks and balances needed to make the NHS accountable. In England, Healthwatch performs some of these functions.

But do these structures work? Nicky Morgan’s case is that we need people with certain skills and knowledge to be School Governors – and that we should move away from appointments based on status (ie who we are) to appointments based on such skills. A further argument (though not one we’ve heard her make as yet) is that if a public body needs to know the views of key stakeholders to help them take decisions, it is so much easier these days to organise an engagement or consultation exercise and gather such data as is needed when the occasion arises. We now have the online tools and can use social media to talk to passengers, patients, tenants, council taxpayers or whoever – and we can do it more efficiently and swiftly than ever before. Why bother with making tokenistic appointments?

But in fact, we should pause for thought. The latest thinking is to promote the idea of ‘continuous engagement’. It means finding ways of ensuring a dialogue that can deal with routine and day-to-day issues, so that we avoid the pattern whereby people are consulted only when there is bad news! Having certain stakeholder interests around the table in the first place is an obvious advantage. In the NHS in England, the involvement of Healthwatch in Health & Wellbeing Boards is a good example of the kind of representation that is beginning to settle down and its supporters believe it is now proving its worth. But, if it is right to phase out Parent Governors, why not also remove the need for Patient representatives or Transport users?

Perhaps we are moving away from an age where paternalist Governments provided opportunities for interest groups to be heard – and into one where those groups have to make their own noise, and force their own demands for dialogue on those organisations that affect them. The modern, harsher, less communitaire, more individualistic culture around us may see technology as enabling those with the wit and mobilisation skills to muscle in on traditional decision-making and wield influence. Some say that social media is already working in this way. In this brave new world, consultation will clearly occur, but affected stakeholders may have to fight for it. Such a world will be anathema to many practitioners. So maybe the ‘appointed voice’ method is not too bad a mechanism after all?

Trigger points

• Do you work with structures where particular viewpoints are embedded through specific stakeholder appointments? If so, how well do they work?
• What impact do such appointments have on the organisation’s commitment to consult?
• Should the practice of ‘appointed voices’ be supported or discouraged?
• On 27th April 2016 in Birmingham, the Institute is hosting a Roundtable on Addressing the Public Engagement Deficit in Local Government Devolution Initiatives. One of the key issues is how to ensure that stakeholder voices are heard.

This is the 295th 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