Thinking about the practice of democracy support officers.

There are two main roles I think.

The first is citizen facing and, as you say, the DSO acts as a guide or navigator, almost an advocate for people coming into contact with the formal process of democracy.

The second is councillor facing and this should be a therapeutic relationship — advice, counselling etc. Our role is to help politicians to be the best that they can be.

I think there is plenty of scope to redesign the DSO role around these two roles — what do you think?

Of course there is always the default robot option: “constitution says no” (some people do prefer that).