Today, alongside lead partners Demos, we’ve published our Citizens’ White Paper , recommending that the new government embarks on an era of public participation in policy making to deliver on the Prime Minister’s promise last week to restore trust in politics.
As reported in The Financial Times, The Independent and The Evening Standard today, our Citizens’ White Paper outlines how trusting citizens to participate in policy-making, and building in structured ways to do this into the policy process, would restore trust and help stem the rising tides of populism.
The paper sets out a practical, costed roadmap to change, deliverable over the next parliament, that enables citizens to participate in the important policy decisions which the new government will face. It builds on the Demos and Involve teams’ comprehensive policy and practice experience, and has been developed with input from ex-ministers, shadow ministers, senior civil servants, parliamentary officers, academics and experts from across the field.
The recommendations in brief:
- Establish panels of randomly selected and demographically representative citizens to feed into each of the new government’s Mission Boards
- Embed participation across the civil service to strengthen policy making at all levels
- Introduce a programme of citizens assemblies to resolve some of the big, stuck policy questions such as social care, or difficult moral decisions, such as assisted dying
- Set standards and embed practice to ensure citizen participation is independent and rigorous, in line with international best practice, and ensure it reinforces representative democracy.
Sarah Castell, CEO of Involve and co-author of the paper, said,
“The new government needs to deliver policy solutions that really work for people - and at the same time rebuild public trust. Getting people from all walks of life involved in decisions has a proven track record of achieving both. This report provides a roadmap for how the new government can tackle the big policy challenges together.”
Miriam Levin, Director of Participatory Programmes at Demos and co-author of the Citizens’ White Paper, highlighted the urgent need for these reforms:
“Our political system isn’t equipped to deal with the challenges we face, nor the threat of populism. We need a new layer of participation embedded at the heart of our political system to renew our democracy.”
The paper also reveals public enthusiasm for participation, with 63% of those surveyed expressing willingness to join participatory policy making exercises, notably surpassing the 52% turnout at the 2024 general election.
The Citizens’ White Paper comes as the new government has outlined intentions to strengthen participation in policy making. The Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, has detailed plans to use customer panels to hold water company bosses to account. Meanwhile, Whitehall is preparing to advise ministers, recently launching a Participatory Methods Forum to grow the expertise and capacity of the civil service.
The Citizens’ White Paper outlines immediate steps for the government’s first 100 days, short-term actions for the coming year, and longer-term plans to embed participatory approaches deeply into the political system.