There are considerable advantages to allowing some form of consultation or participation before rules are made. it enables views to be taken into account before an administrative policy has hardened into a draft rule. ll can assist the legislature with technical scrutiny. is hoped that there will be better rules as a result of input from interested parties, particularly where they have some knowledge of the area being regulated. A duty to consult allows those outside government to play some role the shaping of policy. In this sense it enhances participation. It is moreover not immediately self-evident why a hearing should be thought natural when there is some form of individualized adjudication, but not where rules are being made. The unspoken presumption is that a ‘hearing’ will be given to a rule indirectly through the operation of our principles of representative democracy. Reality falls short of this ideal, both in the UK and in the United States.