Outcomes from the e-consultation trial

Technology and usability

After initially setting up the website to be used as part of the consultation, researchers gave Wheel personnel an opportunity to give feedback on the site in terms of its usability. These views were collected in the course of a focus group. While in general, the view was that the potential for e-technology was very positive, there were some problems with the design of the site. A common complaint was that the site needed to be clearer and easier to navigate. Another point raised was that the site needed to state clear instructions and set out expectations, devise limits to the particular consultation, and finally, state what will happen to submissions. The registration process was particularly identified as overtly complicated. On the basis of these recommendations, the researchers significantly modified the site to the satisfaction of the Wheel. Prior to launching the consultation, a number of participants were invited to take part in a pretrial usability survey. Bearing in mind that all participants considered themselves to be frequent computer and Internet users, most found the site relevantly easy to navigate. Some participants felt that the site provided the necessary information needed to engage in the consultation in a traight-forward manner, while the majority felt that most people could learn to use the website ery quickly. At a more critical level, a number of participants felt that the site was still nnecessarily complex, that the information provided was somewhat opaque and that this would prevent them from frequently using the website. It must be stated however, that this was the inority view expressed. Once the site was running, it worked without any major problems. Because it accepts e-mails, the researchers had to delete spam every few days. We had not included a spam filter in the software set up, but the manual deletion was easy. There were no offensive messages posted, only a few commercial advertisements (the spam). In general, we have found that worries about having to inspect sites for offensive comments are exaggerated. More difficult is getting anyone to participate at all. The technology for collecting voice mail and text messages worked surprisingly well. Our only problem was when there was a power cut at QUB that affected the computer plugged in to the mobile ‘phones. It had to be restarted when the power came back on. The voice mail kept on working.

Issues of participation

From an early stage in planning and designing the e-consultation, the researchers were at pains to point out to the Wheel that e-technologies were not a ‘magic bullet’ for boosting quality or levels of participation. It was impressed on the Wheel that in order to engage significant numbers of consultees, resources would to be employed to publicise the consultation. In turn, it was made clear to the researchers that the Wheel was not able to expend any significant resources in this respect, citing that it wished to wait until the Task Force was formally announced by the Taoiseach and use the ensuing press coverage to publicise the Wheel’s own consultation on active citizenship. The researchers believe that this had a significant impact on the low quantity of participation in the E-consultation.

However, the quality of participation was high, as can been seen from reading the sample messages above. The site had succeeded in getting a range of views and experiences from people that would have not appeared in formal submissions on consultation documents. And this was at a far lower cost than running public meetings or focus groups across Ireland.

There were also problems of participation among the consulters, as the staff changed at The Wheel. Few of the people who started the e-consultation are still in place, which means that people came in half-way through, perhaps not fully understanding what was going on. This would affect any consultation process, electronic or not, but confirms the importance of having enough resources for a consultation, as noted in the NSEC trial.