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CHAPTER EIGHT: CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Introduction
8.1 This chapter presents the conclusions and recommendations emerging from the evaluation, drawing on the evidence presented in chapters two to six. The first section draws conclusions about the key aspects of the evaluation, then our recommendations are presented.
Conclusions
8.2 The main aims of this evaluation were to assess the effectiveness of the pilot in terms of its impact on community engagement; its contribution to the functioning and role of involved Community Councils ( CCs); and the potential for wider rollout to other CCs and groups throughout Scotland. This section presents our conclusions on these objectives.
Impact on community engagement
Project development and objectives
8.3 The project objectives were set by a Steering Group of Community Councillors. These were two-fold: to develop a tool to help CCs function effectively and to investigate methods of engaging the community in democracy.
8.4 Crucially, only a limited feasibility / needs assessment was carried out at the start of the project. The planning stage only took into account the needs of the local CCs, but did not establish what other e-democracy initiatives were taking place in Scotland or across the rest of the world. A more thorough feasibility study looking at existing literature and comparison websites would have informed stakeholders of the main issues and pitfalls to avoid. . The funding application should have made this requirement explicit.
8.5 The pilot website's impact on community engagement was limited, but nevertheless valuable, judged against the original objective to improve and enhance dialogue and engagement between CCs and local communities in support of their work. It is arguable whether or not the objective to develop a "community e-democracy model" was fulfilled. Although usage of the website generally grew over the period of the pilot, the web statistics collected provided no meaningful information on the demographics of its users.
Representativeness
8.6 The project failed to effectively engage disadvantaged groups, although the project partners chose to regard the whole community as traditionally non-participative. Stakeholders adopted a narrow definition of 'excluded groups', taking this to mean those without access to the internet and nothing was done to involve groups within communities who do not usually engage - or include under-represented groups. Marketing in local communities was limited, and did not target specific excluded groups such as minority ethnic groups, older people or young people.
Quality of engagement
8.7 Those who did engage with the pilot were generally using the website to raise local issues, receive information and share opinions. In several cases there was evidence that local people's opinions had been listened to, and acted upon. Examples of where local people had influenced their local community were evident on the website (for example the resolution of the issue of bikers in the local wood and the change to a local bus route).
8.8 The website suffered from spamming and a spate of highly politicised, and in some cases personal comments. Some website users also expressed scepticism as to whether their comments were being taken on board, and questioned what the impacts of the website would be on local democracy. Other users however were very positive about the website and the contribution it could make locally.
Increase in public participation
8.9 The pilot project led to some very small increases in public participation in one or two of the six pilot areas. Stakeholders believed that some users of the website were 'newcomers' (who had not participated in CC processes / attended meetings previously). One new CC member was recruited via the website - instead of having to attend regular meetings. The website also allowed people to provide their views more easily to the CC on an informal basis rather than having to write a formal letter or attend a public meeting. One CC said attendance at its regular meetings had grown from 2-3 people to around 3-5 people each time, and attributed this to raised levels of interest due to the pilot website.
Contribution to the functioning and role of Community Councils
8.10 The project was more successful in supporting the role and functioning of the CCs. Stakeholders felt the pilot website had improved the way they handled paperwork, administration, preparation for meetings and organisation of tasks. The pilot enabled CCs to better organise responses to planning applications, consultations and arrange petitions. Councillors felt they could now more easily tap into the community's views (given relatively small numbers participating) and felt they now better understood their community's needs.
8.11 However, in some cases, the councillors - particularly secretaries - said their workload had increased since the website because they now had to regularly monitor the website on top of maintaining existing channels of communication. Only two or three of the six CCs really saw benefits to having the website and its toolkit. Usage was in fact very low among some of the councillors.
Transparency and accountability
8.12 The councillors felt that the website had made CCs more transparent and accountable to their local community as now everyone (notwithstanding internet accesses levels) had access to raise issues, and keep track of how the CC was dealing with them. It was not clear that this had translated into an increase in public trust and confidence in local administrations.
Technical issues
8.13 Technically the website was not well-executed. It was not accessible as defined under the Disability Discrimination Act which means many disabled users may have had difficulties accessing it. The Content Management System ( CMS) did not allow CCs to manage the website themselves and the functionality to be able to network between all six sites.
Potential for rollout to other Community Councils and groups throughout Scotland
8.14 The pilot project did not plan for the financial sustainability of the project beyond the life of the funding. Given our experience of programme management this was something we would have expected to have seen in any funded project.
8.15 Now funding has ended, the stakeholders are committed to extending the pilot into a longer-term project. They were beginning to explore several possible avenues for future rollout of the project, including asking all CCs to pay a subscription fee. However there are now alternative models available on the market - within Scotland - which are much more cost effective. Therefore, the potential for cost-effective rollout of this particular pilot model may be fairly limited.
8.16 The pilot project engaged with some members of its community and led to some small improvements in local planning and local issues. It also helped some of the involved CCs to function more effectively. If this project was funded to experiment with online e-Democracy then we agree that the project has provided valuable learning lessons about enhancing local democracy.
8.17 However, funding relatively high-cost projects that return low levels of activity, that do not clearly show how local democratic participation was enhanced, is a high-risk activity for the Scottish Executive or any public body. Any future funding may be better focused on encouraging significant participation in alternative low-cost approaches that are able to grow organically to embrace participation and debate.
Recommendations
8.18 Below we make a series of recommendations which should be taken into consideration during any further development of this project. We have grouped our recommendations into technical design, engagement with the community and future rollout.
Technical and usability recommendations
8.19 Consideration should be given to adopting a new or re-designed technical model before rollout is considered. Should the decision be made to stay with the current model we would recommend some major improvements.
8.20 The current technical model for this website is a blog. The current blog software is technically poor. We recommend adopting a better blogging tool. There are a number of software solutions available including the free open source application 'Wordpress' 35 which offers ease of use, ease of install, ease of maintenance, dedicated anti-spam tools, innate ability to produce valid, standards compliant code, a huge amount of free third party plug-ins to help in a variety of situations and a large online support community. Dozens of others are also available.
8.21 It may be beneficial instead to abandon the blog model in favour of the forum model within the current setup. A web based forum is a much more suitable environment for debate and as it requires registration negates the spam issue completely. This will also help to ensure that all users were genuinely interested in the locality. There are a number of software solutions available including the free open source forum application 'Pun BB'. 36 Dozens of others are also available.
8.22 The accessibility of the website should be brought up to Priority 2 ( AA) standards to bring it into line with the provisions of the Disability Discrimination Act.
8.23 Additional functionality should be added to the website and the CMS should have and the capability to link all six sub-sites together and post documents or surveys to all six websites at once. This will enable councillors to take responsibility for management of the website.
8.24 The look and feel of the website could be improved to add more colour and locally-specific images. This will enable the development of websites that reflect local identities. Each CC homepage should be made unique in order to differentiate between the local areas.
8.25 A more systematic approach to authentication of users (perhaps through a registration area) would be recommended - this would validate the responses received and prevent spamming.
Recommendations on engagement
8.26 Engaging with local communities in the pilot areas needs to be prioritised. Local community groups and public organisations, such as parent and toddler groups, heritage groups, libraries, cinemas, social clubs, sports clubs etc should be included on the website. This will give the website a more local feel and provide more incentives for local people to visit the website, as has been done successfully on other community websites elsewhere in Scotland and more widely.
8.27 Engaging with disengaged groups such as young people and working people who have less time to attend public meetings also needs to be given consideration.
8.28 Future activity needs to be marketed to the local community using mixed media in order to reach all members of the community (for example notice boards, local newspapers, tenants' newsletters, and networking through other community groups).
8.29 The websites need be made to look relevant and up to date, and this was not always the case with the pilot websites. Comments need to be responded to within a reasonable time frame, the website needs to be regularly updated 37 (particularly the front pages). The impacts of people's comments need to be included on the site (so people can see where they have helped to make a difference). Ongoing feedback needs to be provided to users to reassure them they are being listened to. This will require ongoing commitment from all the councillors.
Recommendations on rollout
8.30 The exploration of opportunities for future funding should start at a fairly local scale, for example with neighbouring CCs or across the Stirling area, before attempting to expand to other areas of the country or nationally. Allowing controlled advertising on the website to fund the project - as in other web models - should be considered as an option.
8.31 The Steering Group should undertake a thorough scoping and costing phase to assess the different models for rollout in terms of financial viability. Specifically, this should assess how many of the 1,200 CCs would buy into the model to establish a level of demand for this product, given that many CCs already have websites with similar functionality. The ASCC may be able to contact its members to pursue this issue on behalf of the steering group.
8.32 The recommended option would be to move the project over to one of the existing more cost-effective models in existence (such as The Local Channel). These models offer similar functionality to the pilot project model, plus hosting and user support, for a much reduced cost.
8.33 In this instance some of the toolkit of additional functionalities - specifically those which support the role and functioning of CCs - could be incorporated with another model to provide the 'best of both worlds'.
8.34 The development of a user-manual or interactive self-help training DVD may be advisable for helping future users - examples could be obtained from other models such as the local Channel which provides user support. The manual should also cover 'etiquette' in managing an online forum / discussion.
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