Governments which choose to actively consult the public on issues ranging from budget to policy decisions need to realize a few things. The first is that if you ask ordinary citizens for their opinion, they’re going to give it to you, loud and clear. The second is that you may get more feedback than you bargained for. The third is this: restrict the discussion to your peril.

These were the messages I heard at the first Ontario Citizens’ Dialogue, designed to provide the provincial government with direction on the budget and its projected $5.6 billion deficit. The session was a closed-door eight-hour focus group with a contingent of ordinary citizens from across the province. I had been lucky enough to be one of the randomly-selected 50 citizens. Held recently at a Toronto hotel, it was facilitated by the Canadian Policy Research Networks (CPRN), an organization based in Ottawa.

From B.C. to New Brunswick, public consultation and inclusiveness has become as trendy as asking for Conrad Black’s resignation. Just look at some of the headlines: “Martin urges parliamentary reform, end to ‘democratic deficit’” (CBC, October 22, 2002); “[Ontario] Liberals ask public for deficit solutions” (Toronto Star, February 10, 2004); “B.C. Information and Privacy commissioner welcomes open cabinet” (CBC N, May 24, 2001). The list goes on.

Could democratic reform be sweeping the nation?

In Ontario, critics of Premier Dalton McGuinty’s Citizens’ Dialogue suggest that the government isn’t looking for public input as much as it is the appearance of it. Real cynics argue that the government intends to manipulate the discussions — conducted in a series of town hall meetings, focus groups and online discussions — in order to have the public endorse decisions it has already made.

As a single participant out of 50, you walk into a discussion like this not knowing whether your own views will be looked at by others as naïve or uninformed. Perhaps you wonder, as I did, if a majority of the people in the room would be of a different political colour from you. Maybe people would argue for more tax cuts and program cuts. Maybe you’ll view others as being out of touch, uninformed and disengaged.

When the group, at the start of the day, was presented with the workbook that would guide the discussion about how to tackle the deficit, almost immediately participants began drawing attention to the restricted strategies they were being asked to consider and the euphemistic language used to describe them.

The suggested strategies were:

  • Concentrate on Core Priorities (education, health, environment, cities). Anything not deemed a core priority could be “eliminated or provided by others.”
  • Enhance revenue from government assets, which included LCBO, TVOntario and Ontario Hydro. “Enhance” meant anything from selling to leasing of these assets.
  • Foster conservation and sustainability of resources. This included the potential of user fees to use natural resources such as water, and to encourage conservation.
  • Transform the way government delivers services. No one knew what this meant, but the participants widely interpreted it as privatizing such services as health care, among others.

If the finances were in such dire straights, as we had been shown, why weren’t tax increases being considered? Why were the strategies so vague? If we were being asked to make such “difficult choices,” as the Premier had written in his opening letter to us, why weren’t we given the tools to make such choices?

Our lead facilitator from CPRN was growing slightly displeased by the early unpredictable turn in the dialogue, and the day had just begun. She encouraged us to make these “other suggestions” in our breakout sessions. She really mostly wanted to stay on schedule.

In the breakout sessions of ten people each, we were given 45 minutes to discuss all four strategies. Having reconvened with the other groups when our time was up, we were then asked to share with everyone else only the positive things we had to say about the strategies — apparently criticism was seen as a negative. Though our group tried to resist this, the facilitators decided to rewrite our group’s findings, leaving off anything which brought attention to the problems of the strategies and the facilitation process.

Over lunch, a summary of all groups’ points was circulated back to the participants, as we continued the discussion back in our breakout rooms. Of the 19 messages the participants agreed it wanted to send to the government by way of “principles,” only 12 were listed in the official summary given back to us by the facilitators. What happened to the other seven?

It was clear many participants were beginning to question how democratic this process was going to be. Anytime a question of process was raised by a participant, the lead facilitator would get noticeably more irritated, and told us there would be time to raise such issues. But there never was.

As the tension continued to rise, the participants moved from a dynamic of facilitation to activism, nearly en masse. Once it became clear that the process, as set by the CPRN, was not going to enable the groups to communicate their messages, they found their own way of putting their ideas on the table.

In summary, those messages were:

  • do not base the entire budget strategy around deficit reduction;
  • do not sell any publicly-owned assets;
  • do not cut any more to social programs, whether or not they are deemed as being in “priority areas”;
  • charge user fees to encourage conservation;
  • put targeted income tax raises back on the table as a way of raising revenue.

At the end of the day, only one of the recommendations, the user fees, was noted in the workbook as an area for consideration.

The room had become charged with engaged and informed discussion of the issues. We had all come away with enormous respect for our fellow citizens and some renewed optimism for the potential of democratic processes. But many, myself included, also spoke our fears that the government wouldn’t listen.

The 50 ordinary citizens who agreed to participate in this process were brave enough to make the “tough decisions” to which Dalton McGuinty referred, often in spite of the very process they themselves designed. Indeed, some of the recommendations may go farther than McGuinty himself may be comfortable with. To return to the era of income tax hikes is likely not going to sit well with the Canadian Taxpayers Federation or other conservative groups who opposed such measures. Nor, to be fair, was the idea wholeheartedly endorsed by every participant in the Citizens’ Dialogue. But, as the group argued, it is ultimately going to have to be re-examined if this or any future government chooses to preserve the institutions created for the public good.

Not to take the public’s considered opinion into account after such well-publicized requests for it breaches a sacred trust between citizens and public representatives. It further erodes not only confidence in the government itself, but in the effectiveness of the entire democratic system as it is practiced. This is the real legacy that eight years of the Tory government left Ontario: the deep feeling shared by many ordinary citizens that their own opinion — and therefore, they themselves — simply don’t matter in society anymore. Is it any wonder people don’t vote?

The public is not bound by the same political obligations as politicians. None of us need worry that someone won’t vote for us in the next election. How ironic that the Premier asked us to be ready to make tough choices. We did, in spite of the obstacles they put in our way. Will they?