Developing a strategy for your local Evening and Night Time Economy (ENTE) involves balancing the needs of many different stakeholder groups to ensure that while business can thrive and customers can enjoy a vibrant, diverse and desirable offer, the needs of local residents are also put at the heart of strategy development. 

There can be many contentious issues such as sound, public nuisance, anti-social behaviour and public urination, amongst others. So how to develop a strategy that balances all of these on the face of it potentially conflicting priorities? An increasingly popular approach and one that we recently supported in the City of Westminster is to convene a Citizens’ Assembly or Stakeholder Assembly. 

Citizens’ Assemblies are a form of ‘Participatory Democracy’ designed to ensure that strategy and policy are steered by principles that are majority agreed on by the participants. This approach can cover any number of topics such as climate change, devolution, crime and in this case night time economy strategy. The concept is a simple one in that the Assembly is posed a relevant question, ideally decided upon by a panel of subject matter experts beforehand. The Assembly participants are then given information around the topic to help inform their later deliberations and decision making. 

The Westminster After Dark Stakeholder Assembly is a superb example of best practice in this area. The project was part funded by the Mayor of London through the Greater London Authority Business Friendly Licensing Fund, designed to trial innovative ideas that can help licensed premises thrive at a time when they face numerous challenges. This Assembly strove to ensure that all voices were heard including those of residents, visitors, young people, night workers and businesses. Some critical factors to ensure a successful Assembly include: 

Encourage Participation: Promoting the purpose of the Assembly well in advance encourages people to register their interest in participating and also gives the wider community the chance to contribute their thoughts. In Westminster an online map-based platform called Commonplace was used where anyone could flag their own views on specific areas of the borough. In this case over 1000 responses were collected. 

Representative Participants: It is important that the voices of all sections of the community can be heard. In Westminster the 50 Assembly participants were selected using online software that anonymised applicants and selected them according to the characteristics programmed including sex, age, race, sexuality, gender identity, religion, together with their role within Westminster – resident, business owner, visitor, student and night worker. 

In this case overall participation in the wider consultation process by 18–34-year-olds was 36%, and participation by global majority individuals was almost 50%, an increase of nearly 30% compared with typical engagement in Westminster.

Independent Facilitation: It is important that the participants in the Assembly feel that they can contribute based on their own views. Sometimes ‘speaking to power’ or to those who have ‘skin in the game’ can be uncomfortable for people, and so independent professional facilitation ensures that everyone feels they have the opportunity to contribute. Six Till Six CEO Sylvia Oates and Associate David Lucas facilitated the assembly in Westminster over the course of three days. Together they ensured that participants understood the ground rules of mutual respect of the views of others, and that everyone got an opportunity to be brought into the conversation. As subject matter experts Sylvia and David were able to drill down into the issues from a place of knowledge and ensure informed and productive outcomes.

Informative and Engaging Assembly Sessions: Deciding on the themes that will inform the Assembly and bringing subject matter experts to speak on these themes gives the participants the knowledge they need to make informed deliberations. Assembly sessions should include presentations, plenary and smaller group discussions and should be structured to be as interactive as possible. In Westminster over 30 subject matter experts volunteered their time to present to and engage with participants, as well as helping them to better understand which of their ideas would have a realistic chance of being pursued and why. 

Time for Deliberation: The Assembly participants will be gaining a lot of new knowledge and need time to absorb and reflect on this. Making sure there is sufficient time on each day and between the Assembly days for this reflection is very important to avoid any sense of ‘information overload’ and to allow participants the time to reflect on what they’ve heard and on the views of others, and allows the project team the time find out answers to any matters raised during the assembly

Collective Decision Making:  The final Assembly day involves the facilitators presenting the findings of the Assembly with a mechanism to achieve a majority consensus, or not, on each priority identified. The findings of the Assembly might be advisory rather than fully adopted by the lead authority, but if this is the case make it clear and communicate the next steps in the process and how the Assembly participants will be further engaged in the future. 

In conclusion, a Citizens’ Assembly provides the opportunity to tackle the tough stuff, potentially contentious issues, in a collaborative way that includes opposing voices in the room. Assemblies are a very positive, productive way to consider difficult topics fairly and respectfully and we greatly enjoyed being part of this journey in Westminster. 

For more information contact us at hello@sixtillsix.com