The Health Canada Policy Toolkit for Public Involvement in Decision Making

Conclusions

Traditional consultation processes such as elections, referenda, legislative hearings, royal commissions, constituent surveys, town halls and opinion polls are longstanding political mechanisms for ascertaining the will of the public on key public policy issues. These approaches will continue to play an important part in governance and how government involves Canadians. However, the Canadian public is increasingly interested in securing an ongoing, meaningful and deeper role in key policy and program decisions which affect their lives.

The shift from traditional consultation - usually a snapshot of public opinion captured at a particular moment in time - to genuinely deliberative and interactive citizen engagement will require fundamental changes on the part of governments. These changes will take time and resources for Health Canada to implement. In the future, governments will be less likely to act unilaterally in deciding when to involve, on what and with whom. The public is demanding this as a prerequisite for a new relationship of trust.

In all phases of public involvement, an open process is required from the beginning. In the consultation and citizen engagement stages, ideally citizens and their organizations are involved in helping to set agendas, time frames and the nature of the engagement process itself. In certain cases, governments will need to be prepared to step aside at times or to be the convenor of the process and primary carrier of results, but not to preside over and control the process. As Health Canada incorporates these kinds of collaborative approaches increasingly into its planning and operations, the department will be both working to meet the needs of Canadians and aligning itself with a key strategic priority of the federal government.