IRD forum a step toward e-democracy?

OPINION: Inland Revenue is used to laying down the law. It's the nature of its business.

So it reckons it was being pretty radical letting people comment through its website on proposals to change aspects of the student loan scheme.

Revenue minister Peter Dunne says the online forum was an "outstanding success", allowing the department to consult more broadly with many more people.

The forum attracted 156 posts and 4500 visitors from 33 countries. Inland Revenue separately received 26 traditional written submissions.

Posts were moderated to remove anything offensive, but comments critical of the department were allowed.

This is not the first time a government agency has gone all Web 2.0. In 2007, Police let the public comment on proposed changes to the Police Act through a "wiki". The Families Commission and Transport Ministry have also dabbled.

Mr Dunne says Inland Revenue's consultations are not a one-off.

"It is almost inevitable now that will be the format we will use for future consultations on tax matters. We did this through a designated website, but I think in future there is no reason why we can't be on Twitter or Facebook.

"I suspect we might be at the forefront of doing this across government. I note the Law Commission's report on the Sale of Liquor Act is proposing exactly the same type of electronic consultation."

The challenge thrown up by this move to consult online may be the high expectations it sets, and the risk disillusionment will set in once the novelty wears off.

The online world is an egalitarian one. But usually, by the time public officials or politicians go out to public consultation on an issue, they have already pretty much made up their minds on the outcome.

That's to be expected, and perhaps to a degree inevitable.

Consultations are often a case of going through the motions. In other cases they may be designed to test flaws in a plan, or to seek input on technical details of a policy that may need to be tweaked or fleshed out.

Mr Dunne accepts people's willingness to engage in an ongoing online dialogue will depend on their perception that their comments and views have an impact.

"That is obviously the case even with the status quo, but it will certainly be the case in future.

"In this instance, we did want to go out and hear from people who were affected about precisely what were the issues and how the concerns we had about making loans easier to repay could be better addressed. So I don't see that as problematic in this instance, but there will inevitably be other instances down the track that will be more so."

The most controversial change to the loan scheme proposed by the Government would mean students might have to start repaying their loans while doing holiday jobs. That would apparently save Inland Revenue a lot of headaches, but is understandably not popular with all students.

Mr Dunne says a significant amount of the online feedback the department received was on that matter. "My understanding is they were mixed, some for, some against, some for bits, some against other bits.

But on the whole the impression I have received from people who were monitoring it is that the responses were of a quality we can deal with they weren't just people raving, or saying `I agree' or `I disagree'."

So is the proposed policy on holiday job repayments something that genuinely could be reconsidered, based on the feedback from the online forum?

"I am not going to go down the track of what is going to be reconsidered and what is not," says Mr Dunne. "But we were genuinely consulting on a set of proposals they were just proposals, we haven't made any decisions about any of them."

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