Given the fact that Ofcom have run two earlier previous consultation on the 084/7 call abuse issue before this one and that one of these was deliberately and cynically hidden from all public view (even from mine) by Ofcom until it closed and that the later one was a little but only very inadequately publicised, do you suppose the impenetrability of and difficulty in finding out the process for responding to Ofcom's consultation documents is actually accidental or possibly by deliberate design?

Also do you think it is accidental or by deliberate design that Ofcom don't list all their currently open public consultations (which number only 10 or 15 in total across telecoms and broadcasting industries at any one time) prominently with summaries and email addresses for response on their Home Page?

Is it accidental or by deliberate design that Ofcom doesn't have Plain English Summaries of many of its current consultation documents, including its second currently running consultation on the 084/7 call abuse issue? Is it perhaps because Ofcom only really wants its industry chums to comment on these consultations and so hides the email addresses to respond to right in the middle of a 250 page PDF consultation document.

Also is it accidental or by deliberate design that Ofcom insists on a cumbersome Word document cover sheet being attached to emailed responses and is it accidental or by deliberate design that anyone foolish enough to comply with that request then has the readability of their response on the Ofcom website obstructed by the presence of that Cover sheet, which should supposedly only have been kept in Ofcom's own internal records.

Also is it accidental or by deliberate design that Ofcom fails to give respondents the right to publish their email address and phone number (publishing private home addresses I agree is probably rather unwise) with their consultations so that anyone wanting to form a lobby group then cannot get in touch with like minded people to do so.

I being somewhat cynical think that Ofcom deliberately makes it as uninviting as possible for any mere member of the public to respond to a consultation in the hope that it will mainly only receive the views it wants to receive from the telecoms and broadcasting operators.  And I also believe Ofcom don't publish email addresses or phone numbers of private individuals who agree for their responses to be published so as to stop lobbying groups being formed.  But what do the rest of you perhaps think?

Post your answers here and also make them known by either phone to Vicki Nash Ofcom Consultation Champion on 0141 229 7401 or by email to consult@ofcom.org.uk and vicki.nash@ofcom.org.uk plus also copy in the Ofcom CEO stephen.carter@ofcom.org.uk, their Communications Director matt.peacock@ofcom.org.uk and their Consumer Champion gareth.davies@ofcom.org.uk

Agree wholeheartedly that Ofcom have a deliberate policy of making everything as difficult as possible for the consumer.
Their site, overall, is a disgrace in terms of eliciting any information - and contacting them to respond is a nightmare.