Constructive conversations with citizens and stakeholders
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The challenge
Defra (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) is a huge UK government department, with a vast array of legislative responsibilities spanning agriculture, climate change, waste, recycling and more. So when it comes to engaging with stakeholders and the public, they've got a lot of ground to cover.
Previously, they had been consulting and asking for feedback via email, which was clunky and inefficient. There are restrictions in the type of engagement that formal consultation provides, and they recognised the need for a tool that was less constrained by official consultation processes.
The approach
Dialogue is a discursive digital tool that allows public bodies to facilitate thoughtful, constructive discussion with citizens and stakeholders on complex issues. Contributors can rate others' ideas out of five stars and leave comments, with the most popular ideas shown at the top of the page.
Defra ran a challenge on 'Water Abstraction Reform and Water Company Discharge'. It's a complex issue and Defra understood that it needed better regulation, but wanted to capture stakeholder views on how exactly they should proceed.
Dialogue was a way to delve deeper into the specifics and lead a conversation in a way that elicited informed responses. They posted several areas for discussion as 'ideas' and invited comments on each.
The results
It was an ideal way to gather further intelligence to supplement their consultation responses. All respondents' feedback was collated and was used in the development of their final policy.
Delib is a govtech leader specialising in consultation and engagement, trusted by over 600 government organisations worldwide, including major planning projects. Since 2004, we've been building secure, accessible digital platforms to make participation simpler, fairer, and more inclusive. Our flagship product, Citizen Space, was built in collaboration with the UK government and has supported more than 11 million responses across over 110,000 democratic activities.