Writing a submission to government

Universities are strongly emphasising the impact agenda. For legal academics, impact can often take the form of contributing to law reform. Sometimes, our area of law is not on the agenda, and achieving impact may require direct emailing or contacting policy advisors or politicians to try to attempt to bring an issue onto the political agenda (with variable levels of success). 

At other times, though, our area of expertise is the subject of law reform inquiries, consultations, or legislative reform processes. In this case, there is arguably an important public benefit to us writing submissions to government, drawing on our scholarly expertise. This is important for research impact, but also to help ensure that law reform is research-informed and grounded in best practice.

For many years, I have worked closely with other members of ADLEG to draft collective law reform submissions in the area of discrimination law. Working collectively can be a helpful strategy to share the load when law reform is frequent, and to help pool expertise across a broad range of areas. ADLEG shares many of its submissions publicly on its website.

But other times I write individual submissions, often because a topic is beyond ADLEG’s core focus of discrimination law, or if the timeframe of a submission process makes it difficult to work collectively. 

So what makes a good law reform submission or response to consultation? Here are some of the points I have been reflecting on:

• Keep things short. ADLEG’s submissions are often long and detailed, as they are typically responding to all areas addressed in a government inquiry or consultation process. For an individual submission, I am far less ambitious: I pick the areas or terms of reference that align with my expertise, and keep the submission concise and to the point. Ideally, no more than a handful of pages (2-3). 
• Where the submission aligns with your research, cite your research. To my mind, this is important to draw the link between your research and any impact that arises from your submission. Government inquiries will rarely cite your research directly, but may cite a submission which builds on your research.
• Keep your writing accessible: those reading your submission are probably not going to be experts in the area (or, at least, not as expert as you). Try to ensure your writing is accessible to politicians, policy makers, and the general public if your submission is published online.
• In many cases, submissions will be published online unless you request otherwise. Make sure you are comfortable with your submission and what it says entering the public domain.
• I generally start a submission with a statement about who I am, and my experience and expertise, so it gives the submission some legitimacy. 
• I also link my submission back to the terms of reference of the inquiry or consultation, to keep things simple for the person reading the submission. That said, if the terms of reference appear too narrow, or have neglected specific issues, I will absolutely put that in my submission! 

The key message is to keep things as easy as possible for the person on the other end who is tasked with reading and analysing all of these submissions. Structure things clearly, make your point clearly, and draw on evidence when you have it to hand.

All of these points and reflections are built on experience from the pre-generative AI era. Governments are increasingly experimenting with using generative AI to summarise and evaluate submissions. To my mind, this is an extremely risky enterprise. Indeed, studies have shown that AI tools do a pretty poor job of summarising submissions, and actually create more work for the person reviewing the submissions. Using AI to ‘read’ submissions also seems contrary to the aim of promoting participation in government processes. So while these suggestions and reflections hold for now, we may all need to change our approach if AI becomes more embedded in the law reform process.