Agenda item

To consider the range of potential deliberative processes aimed at improving public understanding and engagement with the Council’s Climate Emergency Action Plan.

The Committee considered a report, set out at Agenda pages 19 to 56, which gave details of potential community deliberative processes aimed at improving resident engagement and input into the Council’s Climate Emergency Action Plan. The aim was to submit the recommended deliberative processes to the Executive in July 2021 with a follow-up report to the October 2021 Executive, setting out the financial implications, timeline and expected outcomes.

Diana Tovar and Grant Thornton (from the Climate Emergency team) attended the meeting to introduce the report and answer Member questions.

The report stated that research had been carried out into a number of potential deliberative processes and that an evaluation matrix had been developed in order to rank the different options (Appendix A to the report). Case studies had also been reviewed where processes were used by local authorities. The processes under consideration included citizens’ assemblies, user panels, focus groups, town meetings, area forums, conversation cafes, crowd sourcing and e panels.

The report concluded that, based on the results of the evaluation, the recommended deliberative processes were focus groups and e panels. These methods engaged a wide variety of stakeholders, were low cost, had a relatively quick turnaround and delivered a large amount of useful data.

In the ensuing discussion, Members raised the following points:

Whilst the public engagement was welcomed, there was a lack of clarity on the desired outcome, i.e. which process would help to deliver the most significant level of carbon reduction. The report indicated that greater weighting had been allocated to cost rather than issues such as range of participants and breadth of discussion. The weighting given to different criteria was also subjective. For example, focus groups received 5 for discussion potential whilst citizens’ assembly received 1 for communication of results. However, there were examples of Councils using citizens’ assemblies that had produced reports with recommendations which were widely circulated and used to inform Climate Emergency action plans.

Diana Tovar commented that the option appraisal and methodology had been used to establish a value for the different deliberative processes. The aim was to establish the most cost-effective option in terms of the balance between cost, time, support required and the quality of the outputs which could then be used to inform the Climate Emergency discussions.

There appeared to be some issues relating to the supporting tables in the report. These related to the weightings given to different options and the actual calculations within the tables. For example, Focus Groups scored 5 for discussion potential whilst Citizens Assembly only scored 4. Similarly, Citizens Assembly scored 1 for Communication of Results, defined as “Very slow results and difficult to relate the results into useful communication”. This seemed wrong as a number of Citizens Assemblies (e.g. Camden) had produced reports with recommendations which were then incorporated in climate emergency action plans. Diana stated that the issue with Citizens Assemblies was more around the cost, level of support required and length of the process rather than the quality of information provided. Focus Groups were informed by expert opinions and were able to provide outputs more quickly. Diana confirmed that the tables in the report would be reviewed in relation to the specific issues highlighted by Members.

As part of the option evaluation, what was the definition of deliberative process? It appeared that a number of the options were not true deliberative processes – they were more like opinion gathering tools. Deliberative processes and community engagement were not the same. The report appeared to confuse the two issues and downgraded the importance of discussion. Diana stated that the options had reflected what other local authorities had done in relation to Climate Emergency. Officers had tried to use specific case studies to inform the report.

Some local authorities had been successful in finding external funding to support Climate Assemblies. Did WBC officers seek external funding – if funding could be found, this would change the weighting significantly. Diana commented that officers had tried to identify external funding opportunities but had been unsuccessful.

The report did not include any case studies for the two preferred options – focus groups and e panels. Diana confirmed that case studies had been sought but none had been identified in relation to Climate Emergency.

The report stated that the use of focus groups would allow the targeting of relevant stakeholders who may specialise on or be interested in specific issues under consideration. Was this consistent with the aim of engaging with a more balanced, representative cross-section of the community. Grant Thornton stated that the process would not exclude discussions with a cross-section of the community. The report was, in effect, a balanced scorecard which aimed to guide decision making on the most effective options. The criteria “participant variation” took into account the breadth of engagement to be delivered. Specific financial issues, such as reimbursement for participants, would be considered in due course.

It was proposed by Sarah Kerr and seconded by Paul Fishwick that:

“The Committee has significant reservations relating to this report and does not recommend its approval by the Executive”.

On being put to the vote, the proposal was not approved.

RESOLVED: That the review of potential Climate Emergency Community Deliberative Processes (Appendix A to the report) be noted.