What people are entitled to expect
For a consultation to work well, it needs to take into account the seven principles of the consultation charter. This course helps you to get to grips with the practical implications of observing the principles, demonstrating some of the challenges they pose in practice and various solutions or approaches you can adopt.
I found the Charter foundation course really helpful and easy to follow. I thought it was straightforward to navigate, helped by keeping a structure to each section and making it clear how they all interlink.
Hannah Clements · Buckinghamshire Council
Produced by the Consultation Institute, with subtitles throughout. To run the Charter with your own team, the Charter Workshop gives you everything you need to run it yourself.
Seven principles
The principles work the same way online as they do in a room, and they work as a set. Get one badly wrong and the whole exercise is open to question.
Let people know.
Anyone who could reasonably expect a say should hear about the exercise in good time. It runs both ways: whoever takes the decision also needs to know about any related consultations happening alongside theirs.
Make it easy to take part.
Choose methods that suit the people you want to hear from before your own convenience, and put real effort into reaching those who are usually left out. A move online should never quietly shut people out.
Work in the open.
That includes the early stages, before the questions are even set, and how the options were arrived at. People should be able to see who takes the decision, how and why once it is made.
Share what people need to know.
Give consultees enough to think the issues through properly, including anything that might change their view and anything already settled. This one runs both ways too: a body speaking for its members should say where opinion among them is divided.
Read the responses fairly and promptly.
Keep two things apart: what the responses say, and what you think they mean. If you weight the numbers in any way, tell people you have done so.
Close the loop.
People who took part should see both what everyone said and what you decided, in a form that works for them and within a reasonable time. If you do not plan to publish, say so at the start.
Mean it.
Go into a consultation ready to listen, and ready to change your mind. If the decision is already made, asking people what they think wastes their time and breaks this principle.
The seven charter principles of good consultation
How the principles are applied in practice
The challenges of observing the principles in different situations
Consultors and consultees alike.
This course is aimed at anyone who is involved in the process of public engagement and consultation, whether as organisers (consultors) or respondents (consultees).
Self-paced, with the same four steps for each principle, so you always know where you are.
What the principle actually requires of you.
Where it gets difficult once a real consultation is underway.
Approaches you can adopt when it does.
The standard to aim at, then a short module assessment.
Visibility, Accessibility, Transparency, Disclosure, Fair Interpretation and Publication each follow all four. Integrity is a single chapter on context, and the course closes with next steps.
Charter Workshop
Everything you need to facilitate the Charter yourself, so a whole team works the seven principles against a live project. View the workshop → Not sure what you need?Training Needs Diagnostic
Free, and it takes a few minutes. You get course recommendations based on your experience and your practice. Take the diagnostic →Law of Consultation
Three and a half hours on the law that decides whether a consultation survives challenge. £375 → FoundationEL-102An Introduction to the Law of Equality
Forty-five minutes on the Equality Act 2010, the public sector equality duty and Equality Impact Assessments. £95 → Intermediate30 CPDApplying the law of consultation
The intermediate workshop, with a trainer, worked through your own project. View the workshop →Common questions
Anything not covered here, ask us. We answer the same day.
How long does the course take?
Approximately 1 hour 45 minutes. It is self-paced, so you can stop and return, and your place is remembered. Subtitles are available throughout.Is it really free?
Yes. There is nothing to pay and no membership required. You do need to be logged in to a tCI account to enrol, and you can create one as you go.How many CPD points does it carry?
None. The free modules carry no CPD points. Paid e-learning carries five, except the Law of Consultation which carries ten. You still get a tCI certificate of completion.Are there assessments?
A short assessment closes each of the seven principle modules. They check you have taken in the section. There is no exam.What comes after this course?
The Charter Workshop takes the same seven principles into a facilitated session with your own team. For the legal side, Law of Consultation covers common law, legitimate expectation and the Gunning Principles.Can we put a whole team through it?
Yes, and there is nothing to pay. Send the link round, or speak to us and we will set the team up.Seven principles, and what each one asks of you in practice
Free, about an hour and three quarters, and a certificate at the end.