The theatre of debate .... - Re-vitalising democratic debate may be easier than re-habilitating politicians! It’s a matter of responding to the public

Our mature democracy has taken against political practitioners. They compete with estate agents and tabloid journalists for the wooden spoon of professional popularity, and our media delights in pouring scorn on their activities.

Thoughtful commentators have long worried that this is a serious challenge to our democracy, and initiatives such as the Power Commission have wrestled with the problem of re-connecting the governed to those whom we elect. The recent English Communities & Local Government Department White Paper on Empowerment (see Trigger Points below) is just the latest in a string of attempts to bridge this gap and create new mechanisms to help people feel that it’s worth becoming involved in political choices and public debate. We reviewed some of these in the last Tuesday Topic. Now hard on its heels comes the Government’s response to the recent consultation on Local Petitions. It’s a bit of a dog’s dinner of semi-considered issues, but in the middle comes this gem:- We believe that if a petition attracts significant support from the local community, it should be able to trigger a public debate in full council. Nothing radical there, surely?

Well no, and yes. Of course it’s not new to have a debate in full Council – these meetings, however, are not that well attended. Perhaps we need to look at ways to widen their audience?

There is a small but growing interest in web-casting public forums of all kinds – but let’s be fair – one needs to have something interesting to broadcast. Where there is a degree of theatrical excitement such as at Prime Minister’s Question Time, millions get to see the exchanges; Londoners have watched Ken Livingstone and latterly Boris Johnson answer their critics at the GLA, and in principle theatrical forms of accountability have a role in building civic awareness and raising the profile of important issues.

Maybe our problem is that the forum of debate has switched from the Town Meeting or the Council Chamber to the radio and television studios. A John Humphrys or a Jeremy Paxman – like latter-day Grand Inquisitors, put their interviewees on the rack whilst they reach for their thumbscrews. It is marvellous theatre, of course, but is a very contrived form of debate. The modern political interview rarely does justice to the complexities of any particular issue, elevates personality over policy, assumes the worst motives to anyone involved in public life and trivialises genuine attempts to explore new thinking. Soundbite formats discourage genuine discussion and if, woe betide, political opponents happen to agree with each other on air ....what a disaster? With honourable exceptions such as Question Time, policy debates in mainstream broadcasting can be disappointing fare.

There’s a reason for it. Broadcasting – as the name implies – has to appeal to the many, and any programme editor has to assume that most listeners or viewers have only a limited degree of interest in any particular subject. Hence they assume very limited attention spans, and thus the short 3-minute interviews that leave us feeling we haven’t really understood the issues. How different if we have a situation where WE have raised the issue? Would we not then prefer a fuller, more reasoned debate?

This is probably the thinking behind the petitions initiative. Let the Council agendas reflect, not what the bureaucratic machine throws up, but what their citizens genuinely wants to hear discussed. It’s not easy, for the likelihood is that public concerns may span a wider range of issues than those that easily fall within the jurisdiction of a local authority.

But, given the community leadership and place-shaping roles which have received wide support in recent years, an increasing range of subjects can be legitimately tackled in such a forum. Just think of the topics that arouse local interest. New housing developments .... waste treatment facilities .... congestion charging .... school places allocations .... neighbourhood policing .... local health services ....and so on.

Debates initiated by politicians themselves (no matter how important) or journalists (no matter how newsworthy) are still less likely to grab the public’s attention than something they have themselves demanded. The proposed duty to promote democracy is a challenge for forward-thinking Councils – and other public bodies which want to be seen to be responsive – to publicise such debates and make them a feature of better civic engagement.

Trigger points

• Has your organisation a policy or protocol for dealing with public petitions... and does it need strengthening?
• Read the Government’s response to the Consultation on Local Petitions click here
• Check out the latest technologies for web-casting click here
• Explore the whole issue of Media relations and public engagement. The new joint Involve-Consultation Institute training course is available this autumn
• Communities in control: Real power, real people; published July 2008. For a Summary of its contents – See Institute Briefing Paper 14

This is the 116th 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