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Promoting the work of parliament
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Overview | Key points | Viewpoint | Papers presented | Comments and questions
Overview
Parliaments provide a range of services and programs that help to promote public awareness and understanding of their operations and work. A questionnaire completed by parliaments across the world uncovered a range of practices and some common approaches in relation to public information and education, as well as some challenges.
A report presented at the ASGP meeting held in Santiago Chile in April 2003 outlined the main findings from the questionnaire.
Key points
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The great majority of parliaments throughout the world have a public information office responsible for formulating, implementing and managing public relations programs designed to strengthen the image of parliament. Most of those offices are distinct units within the parliamentary administration.
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Staffing levels in these public information offices vary. The most common size of office is between 5 and 9 staff.
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The public information offices are engaged in a wide variety of activities, including media liaison, answering public queries, publishing information brochures, producing audio-visual material, conducting seminars and tours, and even receiving petitions and preparing daily and sessional reports of activities.
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Even those parliaments without a separate public information office still provide public information services.
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Almost all parliaments produce public information documents, including on the role and history of their parliaments, parliamentary practice and procedure, and current activities and issues.
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There is a tendency not to charge for such publications (less than a third of parliaments charged for some or all of their publications).
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Half of the parliaments do not provide information on the work of individual parliamentarians and more than three quarters do not provide information on political parties as part of their parliamentary information.
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Almost all parliaments provide information services for visitors, including information brochures, guided tours and, in some parliaments, multimedia information displays.
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Seminars and exhibitions are part of the public information services of most parliaments, with the parliaments of some countries placing particular emphasis on cultural activities designed to depict the parliament as a good corporate citizen.
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Most parliaments use the media to publicise their work, including through advertisements and press releases. Some also publish magazines and provide broadcast services, including cable television channels.
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Only a small percentage of parliaments (19%) have a public relations officer specialising in committee activities.
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The media generally values the information services provided by parliaments, with direct delivery of information via the Internet creating tensions with the media in only a small percentage of cases (8%).
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For almost all countries, particularly for those with a large landmass, the Internet has become an important adjunct to more traditional means of communication. But 'interactivity' is not a major feature of parliamentary Internet sites at this stage, with only a small percentage (11%) providing interactive communication services such as opinion polls or online discussion groups.
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Around three-quarters of parliaments provide educational services for young people.
- The majority of parliaments are yet to design a real evaluation system to gauge if their initiatives are genuinely working.
Viewpoint
"If our systems of government are to be respected and sustained, they need to be widely understood .Official records of proceedings have long consisted of documents that were produced and hardly read by anyone.The survey reveals that there is a need to feature platforms of information that attract a wider range of non-specialist users, thus increasing the consumption of unmediated information about the work of parliament. This, in my view, would greatly enhance the way in which the population views the political process and its major participants."
Ian Harris, Australia
Papers presented
The paper and questionnaire results on promoting the work of parliament is reproduced in Constitutional and Parliamentary Information No.185, 2003 and is also available online.
Promoting the work of parliament
Ian Harris, Australia
Comments and questions
We welcome comments and questions as a means of continuing discussion on these issues. These should be emailed to the ASGP Joint Secretaries:
Comments and questions, along with responses to questions, will be posted on this site.
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