NHS North West, Public Consultation
Overview
Unique carried out a major stakeholder and public engagement programme for the ‘Best for Health’ consultation process on behalf of Greater Manchester Strategic Health Authority.
The brief
Unique was engaged to work on various components of the ‘Best for Health’ programme. This included the ‘Making it Better’ reorganisation of children’s, young people’s and family health services, the ‘Healthy Futures’ reconfiguration of NHS services in North East Greater Manchester and the ‘Change in Mind’ consultation on mental health services.
The objectives were to help the project teams to:
• Explain to all affected groups why the various reorganisations were needed
• Ensure that they were able to access detailed information
• Maximise the number of responses during the consultations
• Provide information back on the outcomes of the consultation, and next steps
What Unique did
Unique worked with the SHA to implement a wide range of strategies, tactics and materials during the consultation processes. These included:
• Producing consultation documents, summaries etc which were accessible and interesting
• Taking the consultation out to different audiences using tactics such as community buses, public meetings, field marketing, a wide range of targeted materials
• A DVD using a Coronation Street actor whose father had been a local GP
• Public affairs engagement programme for local MPs and Ministers
• Targeted media relations
• Website development and co-ordinated branding across the consultations
Outcome
The consultation processes turned out to be one of the largest in the history of the NHS, and over 50,000 formal responses were received. Unique was judged by the client to have made a significant contribution to the successful outcomes, and the proposals were able to move to implementation.
John Williams, Project Direct – Consultations, NHS North West: “The Unique team has made a significant contribution to the successful delivery of one of the largest public consultations the NHS has ever known.”
Unique Creative Communications
100 Talbot Road, Old Trafford, Manchester, M16 0PG