Proxy voting by councillors: consultation analysis

Methodology and approach

Profile of respondents

A total of 89 responses were received. Eighty-five responses were submitted through the online consultation platform, Citizen Space, and four were received by email. Seventy-five respondents consented to their response being published. Individuals provided 60 of these responses; the remaining 15 responses were from organisations.

Consultation questions

The consultation consisted of three questions:

1. Do you agree that an explicit provision should be introduced to allow a councillor to arrange for their vote to be cast by proxy (Yes/No)

2. Do you agree with the optional criteria set out at paragraph 12 which could be applied by a local authority to allow for proxy voting? (Yes/No)

3. Are there any further comments that you wish to make on the proposal to allow for proxy voting (free text, 300 word maximum)?

Analysis approach

The responses were downloaded into an Excel spreadsheet for analysis. Sensitive information, or information which might identify an individual was redacted for data privacy purposes.

The quantitative analysis consisted of compiling the totals of respondents who answered “yes” or “no” to each of the two closed questions. This approach was also applied to the subgroups of individual and organisational responses.

Some respondents did not provide an answer to all questions. This has been noted, where relevant, in the report.

The qualitative analysis used a coding framework to identify key themes in the responses. These themes were compared with whether the respondents agreed or disagreed with the two closed questions, and whether the responses were received from an individual or an organisation.

It is important to note the following:

• Respondents to any public consultation or engagement event are self-selecting, and the responses may not be representative of the population as a whole;
• This report presents the themes identified in responses from most to least commonly mentioned. All themes, including views shared by small numbers of respondents, are covered; a view expressed by a very small number of participants is not given less weight than more general comments shared by a majority;
• All responses have an equal weighting. We recognise this means a response from an individual has the same weight as the response from an organisation which may represent many members, but this approach ensures all views are presented.

To assist the reader in interpreting the findings, a framework is used to convey the most to least commonly identified themes in responses to each question:

• The most/second most common/prevalent theme; most frequently identified.
• Several respondents, between 10 and 19 respondents, a recurring theme.
• Some respondents, between 5 and 9 respondents, another theme.
• A few / a small number, fewer than 5 respondents, a less common theme.
• Two/one respondent; a singular comment or a view identified in only one or two responses.