Engaging on health

The success of citizen engagement at different levels of government in Canada resulted in numerous reports advocating engagement. The programs in Canada further illustrate that given sufficient time, citizens are willing and able to acquire the skills needed to decide how resources should be allocated for social services. Of course the level of engagement and motivation to become involved will vary between individuals in the community.

The UK has also been experimenting with citizen engagement techniques. The government established the Citizens’ Council in 2002. The purpose was to provide the National Institute of Clinical Excellence (NICE) decision-makers with a “backdrop of public opinion”. The UK National Health Service (NHS) also established the Commission for Patient and Public Involvement in Health in 2003.

A citizen engagement process for Australia

Now would be a good time for the government to engage the Australian public in health care reform and be a primary stakeholder. The outcomes from the engagement process should be used to aid and direct government policy on health care reform. The way in which engagement in Australia would be carried out is outlined by the Health Issues Centre on the Australian Health Care Reform Alliance (AHCRA) website.

Many politicians argue that they represent the wider Australian population and act as representatives and employ this as an excuse for not engaging citizens in health care reform. This is not a legitimate argument because citizens are not directly involved in policy formulation, as they would be in an engagement process.

The government needs to take the lead and ask the people.