Memorandum by the IDeA (Improvement and
Development Agency for Local Government) (LGC 33)
The IDeA supports the ODPM Select Committee
inquiry into the effectiveness of local government consultation
and welcomes the opportunity to present evidence. While there
is a great deal of apparent good practice, there is very little
authoritative guidance on what actually works and its effectiveness
in influencing decision-making. This may be an area that would
benefit from further exploration.
PART 1. GENERAL BACKGROUND
WHAT IS
CONSULTATION?
Consultation has been defined by the Audit Commission
as a "process of dialogue that leads to a decision"[39].
The Webster dictionary definition of consultation is "the
act of consulting or conferring; deliberation of two or more persons
on some matter, with a view to a decision".
Public consultation can take place with individuals
and groups (such as small businesses, specific interest groups,
service users and voluntary organisations). Individuals in the
context of local government can be consulted in four main capacities:
— as consumers or users, when
they are asked for their views about particular services that
they either do, or might, use;
— as taxpayers, when consultation
focuses on the balance between the level of services provided
and their cost
— as citizens, when consultation
focuses on what people think about policy questions, such as the
type of development that might take place in their town centre
or the relative priority that they give to different aspects of
policing; and
— as statutory consultees (planning,
licensing etc).
Councils already have statutory duties to consult
the public on a range of issues. The Local Government Act 2000
set certain statutory duties on local authorities in regard
to consultation:
— In preparing or modifying their community
strategy, a local authority must consult and seek the participation
of such persons as they consider appropriate (Section 4, 3a).
— Executive arrangements—before
drawing up proposals under this section, a local authority must
take reasonable steps to consult the local government electors
for, and other interested persons in, the authority's area (Section
25, 2).
User satisfaction BVPIs—As part
of the statutory best value performance indicator regime (BVPIs),
once every three years, the Office for the Deputy Prime Minister
(ODPM) requires all councils in the country to use a standard
survey to find out how satisfied local people are with the service
that the council provides.
Furthermore, in the Local Government White Paper,
"Strong Local Leadership. Quality Public Services"
(DLTR, 2001), it was stated:
"Effective community engagement leads to
better decisions and better implementation. Community involvement
is a key component of best value. Area consultation and decision
making arrangements have a valuable role to play in helping involve
citizens in decisions which affect them, particularly on neighbourhood
issues" (p 20).
WHY CONSULT?
The main potential benefits of consultation
can be:
— targeting services at what people
want and need;
— improving the quality of services;
— improving the take-up of services;
— tracking overall resident and user
satisfaction;
— testing options for service changes;
— testing public views on conflicting
priorities, key choices and resource decisions;
— supporting bids for resources—it
is sometime a requirement eg neighbourhood renewal and European
funds;
— supporting the development and delivery
of the community strategy and the work of the local strategic
partnership;
— supporting devolved systems of democratic
accountability and services such as area committees and district
offices;
— BVPI and residents surveys can be
used to influence national policy makers; and
— Consultation exercises get people
involved in decision taking and may lead to subsequent greater
interest and engagement with the democratic process.
Consultation can also help to improve the image
of councils. Being perceived as a responsive and "listening
council" can improve overall resident perceptions. A report
by MORI for the Audit Commission found that "being interested
in people's views" was a key driver in the public's level
of trust in public services ("Trust in Public Institutions",
2003).
Further MORI research found that the most important
thing that the public thought councillors should do is "listen
to the views of local people" (56%). This was also the most
popular choice for councillors (52%). Only 32% of the public agree
that "local councillors make a real effort to listen to the
views of local people", compared with 85% of councillors
who thought this. Twenty per cent of the public would like more
say in what the Council does, demonstrating there is an obvious
need for effective consultation, not just better information.
In overall terms, therefore, consultation is
a key part of an open and transparent decision-taking process,
which, if carried out in the right manner and in the right way,
will build public trust in the democratic process and our institutions.
Consultation is also a key element of the current
choice and personalisation agenda. Unless councils know what
people want, it is impossible to come up with flexible solutions
that meet the different interests reflected within wards.
LIMITATIONS OF
CONSULTATION
The potential problems associated with consultation
are:
— Local authorities should ensure that
they do not describe communication as "consultation".
They should be clear from the onset as to whether they are simply
providing information to citizens, undertaking a consultation
exercise with users or attempting to encourage greater involvement
in decision-making. There is no point, for example, in consulting
with the public if the Council's room for manoeuvre is so limited,
either by statutory or budgetary restrictions, that the consultation
is of limited value.
— Where consultation does take place
local authorities must be clear as to whether consultation has
influenced the councils decisions and priorities, and if so how.
Unfortunately this may not always happen and the public are not
told the outcomes of a consultation process.
— "Consultation fatigue"
may set in if a Council consults a group too much, too often or
on similar issues without any visible effect.
In the IDeA's experience most consultation exercises
have had a beneficial effect but we recognise that mistakes have
occasionally been made and these will have inevitably eroded confidence
and trust.
LEARNING FROM
CONSULTATION
In the mid 1990's a Council in Yorkshire and
the Humber, undertook consultation on the possible location of
traffic calming around a stadium development. They sent leaflets
to local people and had road shows displaying the potential location.
The response seemed favourable and consequently the traffic calming
measures were put in place. However, there was immediate reaction
from local residents who were outraged by the outcome. To ascertain
whether this was the feeling of all residents, the Council conducted
door to door surveys, which confirmed there was universal dissatisfaction
with the traffic calming measures. The Council decided that the
only way to solve the problem was to hold a Citizens Jury and
explain why the traffic calming had been put in place. Despite
this, the public was still not persuaded. As a result, the Council
came forward with two proposals—do nothing or take out large
sections of the traffic calming measures. The public overwhelming
supported the latter, costing the Council £500,000. It was
clear that during the original consultation, the public had not
translated the maps into reality and had not understood the consequences.
Had the proposals and outcomes been explained in more detail,
it is unlikely that this situation would have occurred. The Council
learnt a great deal from this early experience, that it is now
able to apply in further consultation.
DOES CONSULTATION
UNDERMINE MEMBERS'
ROLE AS
DECISION-MAKERS?
Councillors are elected to represent the views
of the community and maintain dialogue through their day-to-day
contact with constituents and their problems. While this is indeed
a vital role, it is not realistic to expect individual councillors
to be aware of the views of all the people whom they represent
on every local issue.
Consultation can help members to act as effective
community representatives by giving them a detailed and balanced
view of local people's views on a particular service or policy.
It can also ensure that the less vocal and the most excluded members
of the community get a hearing.
DOES CONSULTATION
WORK?
Generally it does, if used in the right way.
However, it does depend on the nature of the issue being consulted
on. With big, complex issues it is very hard to say if the consultation
has had a direct impact but where the issue being consulted on
is very specific then it does tend to have more of an impact.
CONSULTATION METHODS
AND APPROACHES
Broadly speaking, the kinds of consultation
carried out by public service providers can be divided into two
types:
— Direct consultation with a sample
of people with all those involved, such as group of tenants
affected by a play area, or a traffic management scheme. This
could involve one to one meetings or a public meeting.
— Consultation with a representative
group, such as through sample surveys and citizen panels.
— Consultation with delegates, such
as area forums, and tenants' association or community organisation
members, who represent the views of other local people. [40]
Direct consultation allows authorities to find
out the views of local people at first hand. But in this kind
of consultation it is often limited to particular circumstances.
It can be difficult to make consultees feel involved in the decision-making
process, or to provide feedback to them on how their views were
taken into account. Using delegates who represent the views of
others means that consultees can become more involved in the authority's
decision-making processes, but runs the risk that delegates may
not truly represent the wider community, or even the groups that
have delegated them.
A compromise reached by some authorities is
to set up standing panels of volunteers who can become more involved
in the decision-making process, but who are not delegated to represent
any views other than their own. But even in this model, participants
may become too involved in, or knowledgeable about, the authority's
processes and thus become progressively less representative of
ordinary people. This model is also not usually appropriate for
consulting about some specialist services, such as certain social
services, which are used only by a very small proportion of people.
There are also some difficult issues about users and carers, children
and young people and their parents, who may not have the same
views—or interests on key issues (eg residential care, special
schools, exclusions).
Councils have a history of developing innovative
ways of consulting and involving their communities in the planning
and delivery of services. There are a number of different approaches
to public consultation currently used across local government
reflecting a variety of needs and contexts:
— Citizens Panel—a way to keep
councils informed about public opinion. Panels are made up of
people from across the local authority area who regularly share
their views and ideas on a wide range of issues.
— Citizens Jury—is typically
made up of 16 people, selected as far as possible, to be representative
of the community. They meet over a short period of time (usually
between three and five days) to be informed about a specific local
issue or topic (which may be controversial), to debate the issue
and come to conclusions or identify solutions to it. Citizens
Juries were first used as a method of consultation in the mid
1990's. In 1996, LGMB (the predecessor of the IDeA) wrote to 500
local authorities and invited bids for funding from those interested
in running citizens" juries. Six pilot projects were selected
to receive LGMB funds: (1) a planning project in South Somerset;
(2) delivery of library services in Islington; (3) rural service
delivery in N Kesteven; (4) waste management in Hertfordshire;
(5) reducing the harm of drugs in Lewisham; and (6) effects of
technology developments in Norwich. These pilots and the research
and guidance John Stewart (Institute of Local Government Studies,
University of Birmingham) and the Institute for Public Policy
Research (IPPR) produced on Citizens Juries helped to inform central
government thinking and increased the popularity of this method
across the public sector.
— Area Committees—these
are usually made up of Ward Councillors and partner agencies (both
statutory and community) and aim to provide residents with the
opportunity to make a contribution to key issues which affect
their local community. Twenty six per cent of authorities have
area decision-making structures in place already. The main driver
mentioned by 67% of local authorities with area committees, was
the new political and management arrangements of the Local Government
Act, 2000 together with the requirement to develop a community
strategy (mentioned by 41%). Eighty four per cent believe that
area committees have been successful in reaching more effective
decision making. [41]
— Area Forums—Area Forums
provide their members with the opportunity to give an input on
issues affecting a neighbourhood. 54% of authorities currently
have area forums in place. [42]
— Complaints and comments procedures.
— Focus groups—one off
discussion of a particular topic.
— Surveys—one off surveys
to solicit information from a representative sample of citizens.
— Public Hearings—form
of public meeting limited in size which tends to involve only
interested citizens.
— Community planning—participation
on a broader level to set the policy agenda and to discuss citizens'
vision for community and service provided in it. Draws upon a
range of participation techniques.
— Budget consultation—Central
Government is keen that councils consult local people and other
interests before they make budget or council tax decisions. Its
Guidance, "Council Tax Consultation—Guidelines for
Local Authorities (ODPM, July 2002) ", briefs officers
and members about the implications of alternative research and
consultation techniques. A few councils have carried out referenda
on key elements of budget decision making (eg Bristol City Council
on education budget 2001). However, research on budget consultation
(Who pulls the purse strings? How council consultation on council
tax and budgets can be improved by Mandy Pearse, 2004)
suggested that councils tend to favour more traditional methods
such as meetings, citizens panels and focus groups, "neither
of which is likely to reach the socially excluded."
THE COST
OF CONSULTING
The costs of consultation vary according to
the methods used. Some consultation methods—full-scale consumer
surveys across the whole authority area or citizens' juries, for
example—are relatively expensive. But others—such
as panel surveys or neighbourhood forums—are relatively
inexpensive, especially after the initial structures have been
set up. The absolute cost of consultation is important, but it
is not the only issue. Authorities also need to consider the extent
to which consultation can help them to improve value for money,
make services more effective or even to save money by:
— not providing services that people
neither want nor need;
— maximising take-up of services, especially
those services for which there is a charge;
— providing services that minimise
complaints and avoid expensive correction of mistakes; and
— planning services, especially new
services, effectively so that they do not have to be modified
or adjusted in the near future[43].
PART 2. WHAT LOCAL GOVERNMENT IS DOING[44]
IMPROVING COMMUNICATION
The Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames has
set up a health and social care information user panel. If information
is in plain English, useful, relevant, user friendly and presentable,
it will help the public get the best out of the services offered.
The council decided to involve service users, carers and members
of the public in quality testing its written public information.
Panel members are sent draft publicity materials
and asked to complete a simple questionnaire to feed back their
views on the following areas:
— the ease of understanding of the
language used—is it written in plain English?
— the clarity of the font type and
size used—is the print clear and easy to read?
— the presentation of the information—is
the layout user friendly and attractive?
— the content of the information—does
it tell people what they need to know?
— the planned distribution outlets
and methods of delivery for the information—is the information
distributed in the right place and way?
MULTI-AGENCY
CONSULTATION
Somerset County Council runs a joint consultation
strategy group with all five district councils in Somerset, the
police and health authority. It meets to plan and coordinate consultation
and communications events across the county. It has run several
major projects and has developed very positive working relationships
between members of the group. For example:
— Somerset Influence—a citizens'
panel of 8,000 people, funded and used by all partners;
— Somerset County Council provides
consultation services for district councils and the Police Authority,
including conducting joint surveys on sustainability issues and
crime and disorder;
— joint consultation on political structures.
This was launched with a joint "bonfire";
— the group launched local democracy
week with a CD-rom and electronic voting; and
— the group carries out exercises for
one other, eg, acting as external facilitators;
Families in Focus is a multi-agency initiative
based on housing estates and local neighbourhoods. The overall
aim is to raise aspirations of neighbourhoods by building on community
and family strengths. It empowers children, young people and families
to take control of their lives and make positive choices, improving
the quality of their lives and in turn the quality of life of
the whole community. It is a bottom up, community led project
which encourages consultation and participation and family strengths
at all levels. This has enabled the project to develop and target
resources to need. Families and children have completed satisfaction
surveys following school holidays, community mornings and youth
forum meetings to indicate levels of satisfaction with the programme
and projects. These surveys help direct and shape the project.
A community survey supported by Camden Central Community Umbrella
(SRB6) and Sure start Euston was carried out in the original pilot
project area of Ampthill Square, London by a group of residents
trained by the Thomas Coram Research Unit. The team of community
researchers visited every flat on the estate and got a very high
75% response rate. The most serious problems identified by residents
were drug taking, drug dealing, vandalism and graffiti. When asked
to identify gaps in provision and services, adults prioritised
a safe, clean play area for children on the estate, holiday activities
and outings, and keep fit and exercise classes. Working closely
with other agencies and community volunteers, Families in Focus
has been able to respond to these requests[45].
DECIDING ON
POLICY PRIORITIES
Hertfordshire County Council in deciding on
its Council priorities for 2001-02 originally consulted around
"fighting the loss of green fields", but received strong
feedback that there was also widespread support for the "building
of affordable housing". As a direct result of the consultation,
this then became one of the Councils priorities.
CONSULTATION WITH
YOUNG PEOPLE
Bristol City Council has an active Young People's
Forum and has established Double-click—an online panel for
11 to 17-year-olds. The council has invested in a set of 20 interactive-voting
handsets that are particularly suitable for consulting with young
people and have also been used at a variety of consultation events.
Leicestershire County Council has set up an
advocacy service to work with young people in the council's care.
The Children's Rights Service works with young people to decide
how they want to be consulted and involved with the services they
receive. Young people in care have produced their own video and
written a leaflet on how to complain as well as a leaflet and
information pack for young people.
London Borough of Camden set up a website designed
to engage younger people, which receives around 1,000 hits per
month. The initiative aims to engage traditionally inactive groups
in the democratic process.
However, a survey on citizenship, youth councils
and young people's participation[46]
found that around a quarter of young people on four different
councils felt that "good ideas are never carried out"
and that youth councils are "token". Where young people
do influence strategic decision they appear to have most impact
on youth related services, such as leisure facilities.
CONSULTATION WITH
BLACK AND
MINORITY ETHNIC
(BME) GROUPS
The Borough of Telford & Wrekin consulted
with BME groups as part of its Best Value Review of customer relationships.
Consultation methods included attending places of worship with
translators to seek people's views, holding focus groups with
members of community groups, attending community events with translators
and sending out questionnaires (translated, where necessary) to
various BME community groups in the area. As a result of the consultation
exercise a number of changes were made to Council information
to make it more accessible to BME groups. This included translating
complaints leaflets and key Council posters into different languages,
promoting the Translation and Interpretation Service for those
whose first language was not English and displaying Council information
more widely in places of worship, community group meeting places
etc.
ENGAGING WITH
THE SOCIALLY
EXCLUDED
Hastings Council, along with partner 1066 Housing
Association, set up the Ore Valley project, to tackle unrest among
young people and to consult about the improvements to the housing
stock on four local estates. Consultation centred on a forum with
representatives from residents' and tenants' associations, the
police, health authority, council and the housing association.
A resident was employed as the coordinator of
the forum, and other residents were involved in carrying out a
series of door-to-door surveys. This approach succeeded in gaining
of the views of virtually all the valley's residents, including
people who would not normally respond to consultation. Subsequently,
the strength of the community involvement has been used to help
gain funding for a number of projects that will directly benefit
the community, including homework clubs, a Sure Start project
for under fives, baby clinics and a community education project.
USING NEW
TECHNOLOGY TO
INCREASE PARTICIPATION
AND ENGAGEMENT
Waltham Forest LBC are using technology to help
local people make real decisions about the area they live in.
Their six community councils have been overwhelmingly successful
at encouraging hundreds of people to attend their meetings and
vote on how they want their budgets to be spent. Budgets were
spent on initiatives ranging from environmental projects and safety
schemes to a skateboard park. Encouraged by this, the Council
made the community councils part-community led and offered them
support and training. Debates have since moved from car parking
and un-emptied bins to matters like regeneration and plans for
local schools. A lot of effort has gone into encouraging people
to attend these meetings during the last year. However, it was
the innovative use of handheld voting machines when voting took
place, that captured resident's imagination and helped boost attendance.
Information gathered by Waltham Forest since they were first used
shows that residents were delighted to be able to vote effortlessly
and get the results almost immediately. Waltham Forest is now
looking at ways to expand their use. Their Community Safety Team
is hoping to pilot them in March with a bigger and younger audience
about the sorts of activities they want the council to organise
for the summer holiday[47].
Argyll and Bute Council (Scotland) has more
coastline than France and a third of the population live in settlements
of less than 1,000 people. The council has created video conferencing
facilities that have been used for such diverse purposes as medical
consultations, lobbying the European Parliament, and conversations
between Members of the Scottish Parliament and residents.
Lancashire County Council allows citizens to
register for consultation by text messages to their mobile phones.
Responses to questions that have included, "do you know who
your councillor is" have run into the thousands and are fed
into policy-making processes.
Castle Morpeth Borough Council is just one authority
to have provided web sites for all of its councillors to improve
their visibility and access to constituents. The sites include
contact details, surgery times, and news from their wards.
PART 3. WHAT THE IDeA DOES
— Intrinsic part of the IDeA's ambition
is to raise the public's trust and confidence in local "overnment.
— As part of improvement support encourages
community engagement, leadership and communications.
— Spreads good practice via the knowledge
website—the content on the Connecting with Communities section
(www.idea.gov.uk/communications) of the IDeA website (which has
a dedicated consultation module) supports improvement in this
area by pulling together best practice and guidance on consultation.
The module contains several case studies and useful "how
to" documents—"Listen Up", published by the
Audit Commission' and "Feeling the Pulse II", produced
by the IDeA and MORI. It also contains a "consultation toolkit"
produced by North Lincolnshire Council, which is a quick reference
guide to involving customers and other stakeholders in decisions.
It goes through stages—deciding who to involve, mapping
stakeholders and consulting the hard to reach, deciding what to
consult on, tools for formulating questions, how to consult, quick
method selector, what methods to use and when, start the consultation
and evaluating and using the results. Connecting with communities
has consistently been one of the most visited resources on Knowledge,
and frequency of visits has increased over the past year. Over
the past 18 months there have been close to 50,000 visits to this
resource.
— "Getting closer to communities"
is a Round Six Beacon Theme agreed by the Government and promoted
by the Independent Beacons Panel supported by the IDeA. Assessment
is currently underway—Round six Beacon Councils will be
selected in March 2005. A beacon authority will:
— display a creative interaction
between the different and complementary roles of itself and its
communities;
— have a strategy for invigorating
communities' efforts to add their own characteristic forms of
productivity and value to local society;
— recognize that a major vehicle
for this contribution will be a vigorous local community and voluntary
sector, with extensive and inclusive networks, which has a constructive
dialogue with the authority;
— have devolved structures and
open, participatory opportunities, which facilitate community
involvement in public policy making; and
— ensure that there is a high level
of awareness of these developments, not only in the organisations
of the voluntary and community sector (VCS) but, amongst the bulk
of local residents.
— The IDeA's e-government services
support those involved in Democratic services. E-democracy is
defined as "harnessing the power of new technology to encourage
citizen participation in local decision making between election
time". Through the IDeA's work with the national e-democracy
project, the Agency advises the Department of Constitutional Affairs
and the Cabinet Office's e-government unit on issues around consultation,
e-democracy and engagement, collects and shares best practice,
provides implementation support through direct engagement and
provision of toolkits, presentations and web materials, as well
as creating networks of practitioners through the e-champions
network. This area of work is important for finding new, easier
ways for the interested to engage in local democracy, but it may
do little to provide new contact with "hard to reach groups"
or those without access to new technology.
— The IDeA will be hosting a joint
roundtable discussion in March with the LGA on "how do we
get the most out of customer intelligence?" It will explore
"what do we mean by customer intelligence", how can
we make it work in local public services, who should the public
trust to tell them what's going on, what can local councils and
other parts of the public sector learn from the private sector?"
BIBLIOGRAPHY (BY
DATE)
There are quite an extensive number of publications
on consultation that have been produced over the last two decades[48].
These include the following:
Connecting with Communities—www.idea.gov.uk/communications
Making Decisions Locally. A Survey of Local
Authorities on Area Committees and Area Forums. LGA. September
2004.
How to Consult Your Users An Introductory Guide
an Online guide found at http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/regulation/consultationguidance/content/methods/index.asp.
Cabinet Office. 2004.
What works? Key Lessons from recent e-democracy
literature. MORI and Bristol City Council. Local e-democracy National
project. 2004.
E-Democracy Survey 2005. Local authorities experiences
of democracy on and off line. MORI and Bristol City Council. Local
e-democracy National project.
Casting the Net Wider. Local e-democracy 2003.
Socitm, IDeA and LGA. 2004.
Feeling the Pulse II Prepared by MORI on behalf
of the IDeA. 2003.
Measuring the Magic? Evaluating and researching
young people's participation in public decision-making. Kirby.
P & Bryson. S Carnegie Young People Initiative. 2002.
User Focus and Citizen Engagement. Learning
from Comprehensive Performance Assessment. Briefing 4. Audit Commission.
2002.
Involving Young People in Local Authority Decision
Making. JRF. 2002.
Learning from Local Strategic Partnerships:
LGA advice note for working with their community and voluntary
sectors. LGA. 2002.
Public Participation in local government—a
survey of local authorities. ODPM. 2002.
Code of Practice on written consultation. Cabinet
Office. 2000.
The New Community Strategies: how to involve
local people. 2000. Community Development Foundation.
Let's Talk about it: Principles for consultation
on local governance. LGA. 2000.
Who asked you?—the citizen's perspective
on participation. IDeA. 1999.
Involving Communities in Urban and Rural Regeneration.
DETR. 1999.
Involving users: improving the delivery of local
public services. 1999. Cabinet Office.
Asking your users. How to improve service through
consulting your consumers. National Consumer Council, Citizens;
Consumer Congress. 1999.
Enhancing Public participation in Local Government
A Research Report. DETR. 1998.
Consult your users: an introductory guide. Cabinet
Office. 1998.
Making Better Decisions: Report of an IPPR Symposium
on Citizens' Juries and Other Methods of Public Involvement. Clare
Delap. 1998.
Involving the Public. LGMB. 1998.
Community involvement: use of focus groups in
local government—Newham case study. Local Government Information
Unit. 1998.
Citizens' Juries: Evaluating the Pilot Projects,
LGMB, February 1997.
Citizens' panels: a new approach to community
consultation—Local Government Information Unit. 1997.
Citizens' juries: theory into practice. Anna
Coote and Jo Lenaghan. Institute for Public Policy Research. 1997
Twelve good neighbours: the citizen as juror.
Anna Coote and Deborah Mattinson. The Fabian Society. 1997.
Citizens' juries in local government. The Local
Government Management Board. 1996.
Consulting and Involving the Public; good practice
in local authorities. LGIU. 1995.
Citizens' juries. John Stewart, Elizabeth Kendall
and Anna Coote. Institute for Public Policy Research. 1994.
Getting closer to the public. Local Government
Training Board. 1987.
39 The Audit Commission publication-Listen up: effective
community consultation. Back
40
The Audit Commission publication-Listen up: effective community
consultation. Back
41
Making Decisions Locally. A Survey of Local Authorities on Area
Committees and Area Forums. LGA. September 2004. Back
42
Making Decisions Locally. A Survey of Local Authorities on Area
Committees and Area Forums. LGA. September 2004. Back
43
The Audit Commission publication-Listen up: effective community
consultation. Back
44
All examples, unless otherwise stated are adapted from www.idea.gov.uk/communications
or "Casting the Net Wider. Local e-democracy 2003".
Socitm, IDeA and LGA. Back
45
Extracted from "New Localism in Action. An NLGN Collection".
February 2005. Back
46
Matthew H (2001). "Citizenship, youth councils and young
people's participation. Journal of Youth Studies. Vol 4, No 3. Back
47
Extracted from the Local Government Chronicle, 18 February 2005. Back
48
Please note, this is by no means an exhaustive list. Back
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