The new People's House forum offered to all federal politicians after successful trial in Alicia Payne's Canberra electorate

The "deliberative democracy" forum for citizen engagement in federal politics, introduced in the ACT last year as The Canberra Forum, is now being expanded to all members of Parliament.

Labor's Member for Canberra Alicia Payne and the Liberal member for Casey Aaron Violi with The Voice Casey Forum have been taking part in an Australian-first trial in an effort to be a better and wider informed voice for their electorates.

They worked with collective decision-making advocates, DemocracyCo, to form - in Ms Payne's case - The Canberra Forum, an ongoing, deliberative democracy forum made of up to 45 randomly chosen, engaged Canberrans.

Ms Payne took the forum advice of the past year, on housing policy, to the Labor caucus and into Federal Parliament through Housing Minister Julie Collins.

"It was a great success in being able to show constituents that they're being heard and to give them this opportunity to engage more deeply," she told The Canberra Times. "And also for me to hear more deeply from them on these particular issues."

"We are always saying we want to do more and these recommendations have definitely been heard by the minister and I also will continue to talk about these in our caucus and in Parliament.

DemocracyCo has now developed The People's House model for all 76 Australian senators and 151 MPs if they want to do it.

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DemocracyCo chief executive Emma Fletcher said she is keen to work with any member of Parliament of any political persuasion, indicating it would be beneficial for politicians in marginal electorates to hear beyond the loudest voices, or people with a particular problem to help solve.

"This is a real way of members of Parliament actually reaching in to hear from the people that they're representing, and moving beyond those advocates and lobbyists to get to the people who are there voting them in," Ms Fletcher said.

"Quite often they only hear from people with really loud voices or people who've got more time on their hands to get in contact with them. And more likely, people who are also supporters or voters of theirs."

"They got to younger people, they got people from multicultural backgrounds, they talked to people who aren't they voters that don't support them traditionally."

Climate change, renewable energy, social justice, and community engagement were burning political topics at The Canberra Forum, but housing ended up being the first major subject that members chose to take further.

It is a consensus-based, deliberative grassroots democracy model with participation set down as 20 hours over a 13-week period.

For politicians, Ms Payne said it should be viewed as "one of your tools in your toolkit of engagement with your constituents," while Ms Fletcher said it also "raises awareness of democracy and the importance of the role of people in democracy."

"They really feel like they're making a difference, and that their voices are being heard. And I think quite often people are looking for places to have their voices heard."

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