Downing Street Says » Citizens’ Juries

Asked in broad terms how the citizens’ juries would work, how would the citizens be selected and what would happen to their thoughts, the Prime Minister’s Spokesman (PMS) replied that the juries would usually consist of around 12 to 20 people chosen to be representative of the communities from which they came. They would deliberate for a day, or several days, and the idea would be that they would address defined questions on the basis of written evidence and hearing from witnesses. On the detail, there was no specific template and it would depend very much on the issue involved and the particular approach that the department responsible wanted to take.

Asked if the evidence would be published, the PMS replied that the specifics of each jury would be for the department to work out.

Put that the idea was that the juries’ wisdom then feed through into the department, the PMS replied that the juries would deliberate and then their conclusions and feedback would become part of the policy making process.

Asked if a Minister would be present at each jury, the PMS replied that the exact process and specifics would be something for the individual departments to work through.

Asked how this was different from a focus group or a commissioned poll, the PMS replied that the juries would look at specific issues, and do this in a way that was designed to feed directly into the policy making process. They would look at specific recommendations and would be tested for specific ideas. There were other means of taking a snapshot of public opinion, but this was about introducing more deliberative mechanisms directly into the policy making process.

Asked if people could apply to be a part of these citizens’ juries, the PMS replied that again, the process by which people would be selected would be something for the individual departments and organisers of the specific event. But the intention was for those involved in the citizens’ juries to be representative of the community as a whole.

Asked if there would be a general pool of jurors from which the juries would be selected, the PMS replied that this would not necessarily be the case. Individual departments would be taking these decisions. The key point was that the individuals involved were genuinely representative of the communities were from.

Asked for a timeframe for the larger citizens’ summit, the PMS replied that obviously we would like to take this forward as quickly as was practical, but no specific dates were yet in mind.

Asked for more detail about the citizens’ summit, the PMS replied that in terms of the overall approach to this new form of public consultation and deliberation, the Ministry of Justice had overall responsibly for the programme, in so far as they were responsible for taking forward the constitutional reform agenda and the measures set out in the Prime Minister’s statement to the House in July. But this did not mean that they would be responsible for individual events.

Asked if the Prime Minister had had meeting with the leaders of the opposition parties on this, the PMS replied that there were well established mechanisms for the different political parties to discuss issues and parliamentary business.

Asked if any of the deliberations would be made public, the PMS replied that again this was something that would be determined by departments, and would depend on the particular issue. But as a general principal, we were looking to make the policy making process more open and transparent.

Put that there was no new product here, and asked that if there was no set template to follow, how did this differ from any previous consultation, the PMS replied that the concept of a citizens’ jury was not something that the Prime Minister had come up with this morning. For those who followed these matters closely, it had been used in other countries and there were ways and methods of doing this, in fact the Government had conducted citizens’ juries from time to time already and there were lots of examples both internationally and domestically.

Asked which other countries had used the idea of citizens’ juries, the PMS replied that they had been used in the US.

Put that we had heard these ideas before, the PMS replied that there had been citizens’ juries from time to time in the past. The DTI had a citizens’ jury in 2004 looking at policies to support people in balancing family and work commitments. So they had been used in this country and oversees, but clearly the Prime Minister was setting out a much more intensive process for using citizens’ juries to help inform and develop the policy making process.

Put that some say the voting system itself disengages people, and was it right to conclude that this would not be looking into electoral reform, the PMS replied that there was a long standing debate on this issue, but the Prime Minister’s words spoke for themselves.

Asked if there were any plans for citizens’ juries on the EU Amending Treaty and on Iraq, the PMS replied that there would be a very detailed process of parliamentary scrutiny on the EU Amending Treaty. On Iraq obviously the list of issues that we were looking at was under consideration. But today we were setting out proposals for citizens’ juries in key areas of public services, education, health, and law and order.

Put that this idea sounded so ill thought out that it was barely worth announcing, and was done only to humiliate David Cameron by announcing the defections, the PMS replied that we were not centralisers in No10 to the point where we dictated to each individual department exactly how they were confirming the rollout of the citizens’ juries. Let’s see how the juries evolve before making a judgement on them. The first one would be on Thursday, so journalists would not have to wait too long. There would be opportunities to see how they act in practice. On the second point, what the Prime Minister had set out in his speech and in his Telegraph interview overnight and on the Today Programme this morning was that he wanted to lead a Government that draws on talents of all people in this country, regardless of their individual political persuasion.

Asked what the idea was behind giving charities greater advocacy, the PMS replied that this was something that was set out in July. Charities clearly had an important contribution to make to public debate in this country, and this was the basis on which these new measures had been taken forward.

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» Monday, September 3, 2007

Citizens’ Juries

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