A/HRC/39/28 Participation during decision-making 70. Rights holders should be able to participate in the decision-making process from an early stage, when all options are still open. This entails, for example, that public authorities refrain from taking any formal, irreversible decisions prior to the commencement of the process. It also requires that no steps be taken that would undermine public participation in practice, for example large investments in the direction of one option, or commitments to a certain outcome, including those agreed with another organ of the State, a non-State actor or another State. 71. Any revised, new or updated draft versions of documents relating to the decision(s) should be made public as soon as they are available. 72. Sufficient time for rights holders to prepare and make their contributions during decision-making processes should be provided. This entails, for example, ensuring that opportunities to participate do not exclusively, or in large part, fall during periods of public life traditionally considered as holidays, such as religious festivals, national holidays or major vacation periods in the State concerned. 73. Rights holders should be entitled to submit any information, analyses and opinions directly to the relevant public authority, either electronically or in paper form. Opportunities to provide comments should be easily accessible, free of charge and without excessive formalities. 74. The possibility to submit written comments through online tools should be combined with opportunities for in-person participation. To this purpose, States should consider establishing, for example, multi-stakeholder committees and/or advisory bodies and organizing expert seminars and/or panels and open plenary sessions to allow meaningful participation in all stages of public decision-making processes. Where such structures are established, transparent and inclusive criteria and processes for the representation of members of disadvantaged groups should be adopted. 75. Participatory events should be free of charge and held in venues that are neutral and easily accessible, including for persons with disabilities and older persons. States should also provide reasonable accommodation, as needed. Depending on local circumstances and the decision concerned, in-person participation may be supplemented with online tools, where relevant. 76. The weight given to contributions received through online platforms should be equal to that given to comments received offline. 77. The technical capacities and expertise of public officials responsible for the conduct of participatory processes should be strengthened, including in the areas of information collection, meeting facilitation, strategy formulation, action planning and reporting on outcomes of the decision-making process. 78. Appropriate data collection and management systems for collecting, analysing, deleting and archiving inputs received both online and offline should be developed, and transparency in how those systems are designed and used, and how data is processed and retained, should be ensured. Participation after decision-making 79. The outcome of the participation process should be disseminated in a timely, comprehensive and transparent manner, through appropriate offline and online means. In addition, the following should be provided: (a) decisions; Information regarding the grounds and reasons underlying the (b) Feedback on how the contributions of rights holders have been taken into account or used, what was incorporated, what was left out and the reasons why. For example, a report can be published, together with the decision(s) made, which may include the nature and number of inputs received and provide evidence of how 13