What a public consultation response matrix should include

What is a public consultation response matrix?

A public consultation response matrix is the working record that links each comment to its source, the response, the decision, the action and the wording that will be published. It answers four questions: what was said, who said it, how it was considered, and what happened next.

It is not a spreadsheet of pasted comments. The matrix comes after the analysis: once submissions have been logged, coded and charted (the method is in our guide to how to analyse public submissions), the matrix records the response to each issue and keeps it tied to the original submission.

Why do public bodies need one?

Because many consultation processes require that comments be considered, and a response matrix is the plainest evidence that they were. Without one, the final report has to be rebuilt from email threads, meeting notes and tracked changes, and the link between a comment and its outcome is easily lost.

South African requirements

South African law sets duties to involve the public and, in some processes, to consider what they say. None of these provisions requires a matrix by name, but each assumes a record that can show input was received and taken into account. We checked the following against primary sources on 12 October 2026:

• Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, 1996, sections 59(1)(a), 72(1)(a) and 118(1)(a). The National Assembly, the National Council of Provinces and each provincial legislature must facilitate public involvement in their legislative and other processes and those of their committees. In Doctors for Life International v Speaker of the National Assembly (decided 17 August 2006), the Constitutional Court held that the test is whether what the legislature did was reasonable in the circumstances, and that the duty will often require a meaningful opportunity to be heard.
• Local Government: Municipal Systems Act 32 of 2000, Chapter 4 (in force from 1 March 2001). Section 17(2) requires municipalities to provide for receiving, processing and considering petitions and complaints, notification and public comment procedures, public meetings and hearings, consultative sessions with recognised community organisations, and report-back to the local community. Section 17(3) requires them to take into account the needs of people who cannot read or write, people with disabilities, women and other disadvantaged groups.
• Promotion of Administrative Justice Act 3 of 2000, section 4. Where administrative action materially and adversely affects the rights of the public, the administrator must choose a fair public procedure, such as a public inquiry or notice and comment. Under notice and comment, the administrator must consider the comments received before deciding whether to go ahead, with or without changes.

For a response matrix, three practical points follow. Each comment needs a recorded response, not a blanket acknowledgement. Report-back is part of the process in municipal participation, so the public wording field matters. And for municipal processes, recording channel and language helps show how the special needs listed in section 17(3) were taken into account.

UK and US practice

Two published standards are useful benchmarks for the contents of a response:

• The UK Government's Consultation Principles (guidance last updated 19 March 2018 and still the current version on GOV.UK) say a government response should explain the responses received and how they informed the policy, state how many responses were received, and be published within 12 weeks or with an explanation of why not. These are principles for UK government departments, not South African law.
• The Texas Department of Transportation's Public Comment Response Matrix guidance (version 7, August 2026) says a specific concern needs a specific response, that a repeated canned reply such as "Thank you for your comment" is not sufficient, and that where an issue is already addressed the response should point to the section that addresses it.

What fields should the matrix include?

At minimum: submission ID, comment ID, respondent type, the comment or a faithful summary, theme, document reference, response, decision, action, owner, status, redaction note and public wording. Larger processes add review and approval fields.

Project and consultation details

Record the project name, consultation stage, comment period, responsible body, review team and decision point at the top of the matrix. This context matters when the matrix later sits in a committee pack, a council agenda or an audit file.

Submission and comment references

Give every submission and every separate point a stable reference. One organisation may comment on definitions, funding, governance and implementation in a single letter; each point needs its own row and its own response.

Stable IDs are what let a reviewer check a grouped or summarised response against the original wording.

The comment or a faithful summary

Keep the original wording in the matrix for small consultations; for large ones, keep the original in the source file and put a faithful summary in the matrix with the ID that leads back to it.

• Weak summary: concerns about access.
• Stronger summary: respondents said the proposed changes would make it harder for older residents and wheelchair users to reach the service entrance.

Theme and document reference

Use themes narrow enough to act on, taken from the codebook used in the analysis. "Transport" says little; "scholar transport drop-off at the clinic entrance" gives a reviewer something to answer. Link each comment to the clause, section, question or map it concerns, so the drafting team updates the right part of the document.

Response and decision

The response explains the reasoning; the decision label records the outcome. Avoid "noted" unless no action is needed and the reason is stated.

• Weak response: comment noted.
• Stronger response: no change. The requested amendment falls outside the scope of this draft; the issue has been referred to the service delivery unit for the separate access improvement plan.

Action, owner, status and approval

Record who owns each response and action, who reviewed it, its status and its approval. These fields stop the matrix becoming a static table that nobody is responsible for.

Redaction notes and public wording

Keep internal notes and public wording in separate fields from the start. Internal notes may contain legal advice, draft positions, staff names or respondents' personal details. Public wording must be accurate, approved and safe to publish. Personal information in submissions is also subject to the Protection of Personal Information Act 4 of 2013, which applies to public and private bodies, so decide early what will be published and how respondents are identified.

How is a response matrix different from a consultation report?

The report explains the process, who took part, the main themes and next steps. The matrix is the structured record underneath it that links each comment to a response, decision and action. A consultation matrix used during analysis (comments, codes, themes) often comes first; the response matrix adds the response, decision and publication fields.

A related tool is the findings-to-recommendations matrix used in evaluations and research reports, which links findings to recommendations rather than comments to responses. See how to build a findings-to-recommendations matrix if your output is a report rather than a revised draft.

When is a spreadsheet not enough?

A spreadsheet works for a small consultation with one reviewer and no publication duty. Move to a structured database when comments run into the hundreds, several teams review in parallel, attachments carry technical evidence, or the response must be published and may be challenged.

What makes the structured version work is that the response sits in the same record as the coded submission and the draft clause. On the White Paper on Local Government, comments on the published draft were coded into their own database so that feedback stayed connected to the original evidence; the White Paper on Local Government submissions case study describes that set-up. If you need that kind of record for a live process, we offer a source-linked consultation database, built and handed over to your team.

Where public input does not arrive in one round but continuously, for example through ward-level service monitoring, the same fields work as a running log. See community-led monitoring for that case.

Can AI help build a response matrix?

Yes, for first-pass work that a person then checks: finding duplicates and template responses, suggesting themes, retrieving related comments, drafting summaries and plain-language rewrites. It should not decide the response or the outcome.

The UK Government's AI Playbook (February 2025) sets out principles that include knowing what AI is and what its limits are, and having meaningful human control at the right stages. In a response matrix, that means every AI-assisted summary or draft response carries its source ID and is checked against the original before a decision is recorded.

Copyable response matrix fields

Use these as a starting point and adjust them to the consultation's legal basis, publication rules and review process.

Project name
Consultation stage and comment period
Responsible body and decision point
Submission ID
Comment ID
Respondent type
Channel and language
Original comment or faithful summary
Theme (from codebook)
Document reference (clause, section, question, map)
Response
Decision label
Action taken
Response owner
Reviewer
Status
Approval date
Redaction note
Public wording (approved)

Common mistakes

• Treating the matrix as a summary table. A summary records what people said. The matrix must also show the response, decision and action.
• Losing the link to the submission. Without stable submission and comment IDs, nobody can check a response against what was actually said.
• Themes that are too broad. Broad themes hide the issue a response has to address.
• "Noted" with no reason. It does not show that a comment was considered. State the outcome and why.
• One row for a multi-point submission. Each separate point needs its own comment ID and response.
• Mixing internal notes with public wording. Keep them in separate fields so approval and redaction are manageable.
• Leaving redaction to the end. Decide early what will be published and how respondents are identified.
• Accepting AI summaries unchecked. A tidy summary with no source link is harder to defend, not easier.