I agree with all of the factors listed above. I noticed when I moved from an old industrial relations awards system in Western Australia in 2006 to an individual contracts system in NZ that the fear factor seems to compound the cultural issues Grant describes. I work in the health sector in an organisation with very high risk avoidance and a blaming culture. People are focussed on not making a mistake. It seems the fear of failure discourages open and honest communication internally and sometimes hampers efforts to build good stakeholder relationships. Low key engagement happens at a local level providing the issue is seen as 'safe'(ie we can't address any 'hard' issues).

All the above seem to make rational sense but I wonder about the will to engage. Do government agencies see real engagement with community organizations as something essential if we are to solve some of the societal problems we face?

Do community organizations really trust government agencies (who for many hold the purse strings) or do they even respect them? I have been to my fair share of community consultation meetings and it seems rare for these to be real conversations leading to meaningful outcomes.

Some of the better processes I have been involved in were with people carrying minimal organizational baggage.

Are our organizational structures getting in the way of true dialogue ?

I think the BBGE group has hit the nail on the head in identifying the culture of government as a major issue. The whole system works against public servants who want to have open, meaningful discussions with community stakeholders.

Ridiculous deadines, often unrealistic expectations of Minister's, political point scoring (especially via the Parliamentary Questions process), CEs and dept managers who want to micromanage every possible risk and turn white when they hear a dissenting view, and a lack of really good information sharing between depts are all factors that make it difficult for public servants to take collaborative, open appproaches that they know will give them better, well-informed results.

Good on the BBGE group for opening this discussion up online so all views can be expressed publicly.

The political process inevitably influences the attempts of the staff of government departments to engage with communities. Having participated recently in a governmental pilot that was especially developed to be "designed and built" at local community level, I can report that (despite an astonishingly high turnover of staff) the government staff were and are tremendous. Their engagement has been very high and rewardingly for us the interest level in our project development has also been intense. However now we are coming to the end of the pilot and there has been a change of political leadership, so we are cast into the nerve-jangling area of waiting to discover if our pilot can be translated into a service.

The effect of economic constraints is now a huge factor in the survival of CVS that are government funded. These issues have nothing to do with departmental staff, as they serve "at the pleasure of the Minister" so to speak, and do not set the direction of the department; they have the difficult task of enacting the changes decreed, providing the information ministerially demanded and liaising with community organisations in a constantly changing environment.

Certainly, interpersonal dynamics impact on the contracting process, and relationships built over time do engender trust and confidence in such processes. I would also submit that the political atmosphere impacts explosively on the process, despite the best efforts of all the participants. This, I think, is the factor that is most undermining of trust and confidence for CVS. The perception grows naturally from this disenchantment that "Wellington" has no interest in local communities and prefers to dictate from afar, on a whim.

Incorporation of obligations to engage, (supported by appropriate training and development) in significant documents, along with outcomes based on the Friedman model (and not just statistics) should go a long way to introducing some credibility in the contracting process. Recognition that smaller communities and cultural mores are resentful of external edicts that affect them directly would also be useful in developing effective engagement processes.

Kia ora, I said at the public meeting here in Wellington on Friday that I was going to say it on-line too, so here 'tis. I agree with ALL that has been said, partly because all that has been said is about talking to the converted - that's us! here in this engagement space, now. And that's possibly why the site is so 'quiet' - my experience says, controversy is what gets people going online, not agreement, if we like it we tend to leave it...

So, liking and agreeing with what's been said by OCVS and others, I want the Prime Minister to come out and champion community engagement, I want him and his senior Ministers who share his Cabinet table with him to come out and say they think community engagement is important and they want it to be happening better in THEIR government of OUR country!

That's what I think is the priority that falls out of this OCVS exercise, that to me is to be More Than Just Talk!

If you've read this far, kia ora and thanks!

I agree that there are a lot of tensions within government departments and while I don't want to repeat what has been said before I feel it is important to recognise that the majority of people working in the public sector want to improve the lives of New Zealanders.

As public servants, we work for the government of the day. It takes time though to build trust between a new government and their departments.

The new government is also keen to ensure changes happen quickly and this doesn't necessarily allow for the time required to engage, consult and discuss policy ideas with all the different groups across the community. It does not mean we don't want to.

The financial situation of departments is under scrutiny from all angles with the reduction of costs being one of the goals encouraged by Ministers. The money available for consultation and for engaging with groups around the country is being monitored closely. The number of committees and consumer representative groups funded by departments is also being reviewed.