BY MATT WADE

In 2005, Charnwood Borough Council in Leicestershire created the new post of Consultation Officer to provide a centralised focus for all our consultation work. That’s me.

When taking up my post as Consultation Officer at Charnwood one of my first tasks was to create a second me – a virtual me. As my line manager said at the time “we need an alternative you just in case you are not around and your colleagues need to know how to carry out a consultation”. Setting aside the thought that I might one day be replaced by my own creation, I pushed ahead.

VIRTUAL REALITY

The outcome of this was to take the more traditional idea of consultation policy and guidance documents and turn them into a Consultation Toolkit for Council Officers and Councillors. This was something I had seen other authorities use and wanted us to have. However, as well as a toolkit to guide colleagues through the consultation process, I worked with our Equalities Officer to create a second toolkit with a specific focus on communicating and consulting with those people within Charnwood we had identified as potentially being hard to reach.

FEATURES AND FACILITIES

The Consultation Toolkit is a set of intranet based web pages, databases, lists and documents. The main aspects of the toolkit are a Consultations Database of all past, present and identified future consultations and a ‘How to Carry Out a Consultation’ step-by-step guide. The Consultations Database includes information on every aspect of the consultation and has links to various documents including action plans, business case information, questionnaire templates, consultation reports and evaluations highlighting the successes and lessons learnt.

It also allows colleagues access to a jargon buster; an explanation of methodologies (including when and where to use them); some top tips on carrying out effective consultation and a number of contact databases for consultation companies, local mediaand recommended venues for holding public consultation events.

The Hard to Reach Toolkit works in a similar way but with a focus on those individuals and groups who may be hard to reach and how best to initiate and maintain an effective relationship in terms of communication and consultation.

PROVING THEIR WORTH

These toolkits are living resources that are constantly updated so that they continue to be a repository for good practice to benefit Charnwood Officers and to make sure this information isn’t lost when people move on. It allows us to point someone to a single location and say “if you want to find out what consultation we have done on X, you’ll find it here” rather than “I think X did it but I’m not sure and there was a report, but I can’t remember what happened to it”.

Both of these toolkits can be accessed by everyone who works for Charnwood. As well as highlighting best practice in terms of carrying out consultation it also provided a number of practical resources. They are an essential aspect of our wider commitment to consulting with residents, businesses, partners and others within our Borough. It will allow our Officers and Councillors to hone their consultation skills to ensure that everyone in Charnwood has the opportunity to have their say.

For further information please contact me - Matt Wade – at matthew.wade@charnwood.gov.uk. You can also visit our website at www.charnwood.gov.uk/democracy/ haveyoursay.html to learn more about how we consult.

For information on our equalities work please contact Sarah Cromie at sarah.cromie@charnwood.gov.uk.

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