Scottish Government consultation and policy-making guidance: FOI release

Information requested

You asked for copies of any current written rules or guidance on how interested parties should be involved in policy development, whether in general or relating specifically to schools, or to children and young people. This should include current guidance on conducting formal consultations, but also any relevant rules or guidance covering decisions on whether a formal consultation should be pursued, and, in cases where it is not, any guidance or rules concerned with how different interest groups should be involved in policy development. It should also include any guidance on dealing with requests for involvement in policy development.

Response

A typical way for people to be involved in policy making is through formal consultation. All consultations are published on the Scottish Government Consultation Hub https://consult.gov.scot/. A new consultation handbook has recently been developed and is available to all Scottish Government staff on Saltire, the Scottish Government intranet. A copy of this handbook is attached. Every consultation is unique and new issues are constantly arising. The handbook has ‘draft’ status to allow improvements to be made as new queries arise over the next 12 months.

There is work underway, as part of Scotland's Open Government Action Plan 2018-20 https://www.gov.scot/publications/scotlands-open-government-action-plan-2018-20/, to develop a participation framework aimed at improving the way people take part in open policy-making and delivering services. This is still in development, but if you are interested in this work, please get in touch with the Head of Open Government, Doreen Grove at doreen.grove@gov.scot, and she can explain what is proposed.

Specifically in relation to children and young people, we are developing a strategic approach to participation that aims to mainstream children and young people’s participation in decision-making. As part of this, we are developing a participation webpage on the Scottish Government website. An update on current progress is outlined in this report, under the heading Strategic Approach to Participation: https://www.gov.scot/publications/progressing-human-rights-children-scotland-action-plan-2018-2021-update-2019/

About FOI
The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at http://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.

FOI/201900009119 - Information Released

File type

96 page PDF

File size

2.2 MB