This blog was written by Sally Cupitt, reflecting on her experience as external evaluator of the LCE Programme.
Last year I undertook an evaluation of the Local Climate Engagement Programme (LCE), led by Involve and Shared Future. From 2021-23, LCE supported 21 local authorities (LAs) to better engage the public around local climate decision-making, to help the UK to reach its net zero target.
This complex programme encountered many challenges, and it’s too early to properly judge its impact. But, significant early outcomes have been achieved, not least developing public engagement models for replication and catalysing climate action in some communities and local authorities.
I loved this project, and learned a lot about climate action in the LA context. I am struck that the main learnings about supporting LAs in public engagement and climate action are so similar to my work building evaluation capacity in the voluntary sector. Key findings from the LCE programme include:
Planning and delivering support to LAs (and other organisations)
- A theory of change can be really helpful for:
- Intervention design (based on intended goals, timescale, context and resources)
- Tailoring of support (enabling prospective clients to locate start and desired end points in an outcome chain)
- Evaluation, providing guidance on what success looks like.
- Minimum criteria for support can help target support at those most likely to benefit. A recruitment process may be needed to ascertain if criteria are genuinely in place. Minimum criteria might include:
- An appropriate, ‘live’ project to work on. Those LAs who could immediately implement learning got a lot more out of the process
- Buy in at all relevant levels
- Someone to drive the process day-to-day, with a senior sponsor to support and troubleshoot, combined with a succession plan for staff turnover
- Clear upfront plans to share knowledge and implement learning
- Time and budget to fully engage with the support process and to implement subsequent findings.
- When preparing for and delivering support:
- A scoping phase is essential, but early review is often also needed, as not everything can be known in advance
- Client choice over what aspects are needed is important, but skilled diagnostics by the support provider are likely also required
- Group support is efficient and can offer peer learning, but given that working on a ‘live’ project is most effective, aligning timescales of multiple projects in different organisations is tricky. A pick-and-mix support offer accessed over time may help
- Online support is efficient and accessible but does not often foster networking
- Clear, regular and timely communication supports engagement and increases outcomes.
Encouraging diversity in public engagement
- Working with a diverse range of community partners to market events, and providing an honorarium for participation, can help
- Collecting demographic data on registrants gives the option of then offering places proactively to certain groups, using selection criteria
- Those receiving support may need help to understand the value of reaching diverse organisations, and the role of monitoring diversity to underpin this.
Working in the LA context
- Working with LAs requires:
- time: much of the LCE work took longer than planned
- an understanding of how LAs work and the effects of the electoral system (purdah caused some delays)
- an understanding of where power lies – its not just senior staff who need to be brought along with the process.
- Officers may need support to identify both where buy in is needed and how to get it, and to effectively advocate for new ways of working
- A good business case for public engagement in LA work (or whatever work you are building capacity in) would help, including the cost of dealing with complaints of badly implemented changes, or abortive costs of projects that cannot go ahead after significant public backlash
- LCE encountered extreme LA resource constraints. Despite this, LCE also found a real interest in learning about better PE in climate decision-making in LAs. There is potential for significant change in this area.
I think every point in the learnings above could equally apply to my evaluation-capacity-building work in the voluntary sector. As ever, I appreciate the chance for cross-sectoral learning. More please!
If you want to read more, the LCE evaluation report has just been published.