Real Hearings strongly believes transparent, public commenting on major industrial projects is key to democratic decision making. Large projects by their nature have significant and wide-ranging effects with potential to affect large numbers of people in many different ways. Those people need the opportunity to express their concerns to decision makers, and if they choose, to make their concerns public so others can learn from them too. We believe the environmental project review processes set up by governments are often lacking in transparency, unfairly restrict public input or happen too quickly for the public to provide input. Real Hearings recognizes the need for public commenting to be truly transparent and a matter of public record. Otherwise our trust in government decision making will be eroded. People DO want to have their say about projects that affect them, their families, their communities and the planet. Our mandate is to help their voices be heard – by decision makers and the wider public.