How the Scottish Government got insights into pandemic handling using Dialogue
The challenge
In 2020 Covid-19 hit worldwide, with multiple countries going into lockdown and governments struggling to adjust to a new, unprecedented normal. In many instances, citizens felt the pandemic could have been handled differently by their governments - leading to multiple public inquiries across the globe.
In early 2021, the Scottish Government began to establish a public inquiry into their handling of the coronavirus. Before evidence-taking could begin, Ministers needed to agree the inquiry's terms of reference and overall approach.
The government wanted to hear directly from the public and a wide range of stakeholders on how the inquiry should be set up and what it should cover, rather than deciding this in isolation.
The approach
The Scottish Government used Dialogue as one of several channels for gathering views on establishing the public inquiry.
Dialogue lets participants submit and discuss ideas openly, making it well suited to engagement focused on shaping a process rather than collecting formal evidence.
This ran alongside written submissions by email and a series of online group sessions, giving people multiple ways to take part.
The results
There were 187 comments received through Dialogue, with stakeholders giving detailed feedback on how they believed the inquiry should operate and key points of investigation.
Suggestions for the terms of reference spanned six areas: health and social care, key policy decisions, the "four harms" of the pandemic, pandemic preparedness, communication, and legal frameworks, with learning for future pandemics or emergencies a theme running through all of them.
This early engagement and open dialogue gave Ministers a clear picture of public and stakeholder priorities to inform the inquiry's design from the start.
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.