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Hon'ble
Speaker's Message
The Jatiya Sangsad
is launching its own Institute of Parliamentary Studies.
In doing so the Bangladesh Parliament is joining the
Houses around the world that have established
independent training and research institutions in order
to provide services to its Members, Officials and to the
society at large.
The aim of the IPS
is to act as an information, documentation, research and
orientation centre for the Parliament.
This is particularly important given the
self-proclaimed aim of the Jatiya Sangsad to become
“the centre of all national activities”.
This monthly newsletter will provide all
information on the current and upcoming activities of
the Institute, and will also welcome contributions from
Members and Officials.
I
heartily congratulate all those who have worked behind
the Institute and the Newsletter itself, and wish it a
continuing success.
IPS
Conference on Parliamentary Committee Systems
The
Institute of Parliamentary Studies held its first
International Conference in May 1999 in which different
Committee Systems of Parliaments around the world were
analysed by national and international experts. The
Conference was inaugurated by the Hon. Prime Minister,
Sheikh Hasina, the Hon. Speaker of the Jatiya Sangsad,
the Hon. Minister of Law, Justice and Parliamentary
Affairs and the Secretary of the Bangladesh Parliament
Secretariat. In
total, fifteen presentations were given by Hon’ble
Members of Parliament, both from the Ruling and
Opposition Parties, to an audience of over ninety MPs,
as well as many representatives from NGOs,
academic institutions and donor aid agencies.
The Committee Systems of Bangladesh, UK, and more
generally Asia and the West, were debated by the
participants, as well as topics such as the Oversight of
Government, the Budget and the Role of Committees, the
Function of the Chairpersons of Committees and Women in
the Committee System. The full text of the inaugural
speeches and the presentation papers are available at
the IPS.
The
Development of the Institute of Parliamentary Studies
After
one year of intensive preparations, the Institute of
Parliamentary Studies (IPS) is ready to commence its new
activities. The creation and development of the IPS is
one of the main objectives of the “Strengthening
Parliamentary Democracy” Project, an institutional
development project managed by the Parliament with the
technical assistance of UNDP.Under the leadership of the
Hon. Speaker, the IPS has already initiated some
important activities.
The
Institute was formally inaugurated by the Prime Minister
at a ceremony held on 30 September 1998, attended by the
Hon. Speaker, Members of the House, senior Officials of
the Parliament Secretariat and the United Nations
Resident Co-ordinator in Bangladesh.
The first activity of the Institute was initiated
in March 1999 when the IPS convened a Conference on
Parliamentary Committee Systems, inaugurated by the Hon.
Prime Minister.
Interim
facilities for the Institute have now been established
in the old Ministers’ Hostel, near the main gate of
the Sangsad Bhaban. The IPS hosts new and modern office
spaces, a Computer Training Centre, a large meeting room
and a Seminar Room. The IPS will also soon be the close
neighbour of the Parliamentary Printing Press, another
development supported by the Strengthening Parliamentary
Democracy Project.
The
services of the IPS are focused on two basic principles:
providing orientation for Members of Parliament,
particularly new Members, through facilitating research
work, producing a variety of parliamentary
documentation, and providing specialised orientation
courses such as audiovisual TV communication and
advanced use of computers; and training for staff of the
Bangladesh Parliament Secretariat in both general
parliamentary procedures as well as specialised
wing-wise modules in order to improve their support to
Members and Committees. It is expected that the IPS will
result in a Parliament strengthened in its capacity to
legislate, oversee government and debate issues of
national importance thereby helping to make
parliamentary performance more effective and more
responsive.
IPS
Monographs
As
stated by the Hon. Speaker in His Excellency’s
foreword to this issue, one of the main aims of the
Institute is to provide information and facilitate
research. In this regard, the IPS has initiated a
publication line, similar to the production of written
materials in other Parliaments.
The publications will constitute a set of basic
essays on parliamentary matters, able to provoke debates
on a theoretical perspective as well as to give concrete
guidelines to the Members in their institutional
activity. A series of 20 topics have been selected and
approved by the Hon. Speaker. The Project
“Strengthening Parliamentary Democracy” has already
signed contracts with authors, who will produce the
volumes over a six-month period. It is expected that the
first five titles will be printed in Bangla and English
and presented from September to December 2000.
Rulings
of the Speakers and Handbook for Members
The first title to
be published has been compiled by Mr. Harunur Rashid,
Law Officer of the Parliament, and will contain the Rulings
of the Presiding Officers of the House. The text is
currently under press. The second title to be finalised
is being drafted by Mr. Badiuzzaman, former Deputy
Secretary (Legislation) of the Parliament Secretariat.
Its title is
Handbook for Members of the
Bangladesh Parliament. It shall provide general
information on Parliament and procedures, bodies,
Committees and the Secretariat, as well as remuneration,
pensions and other facilities.
MPs,
Professors and Barristers
Twelve
Hon. Members, from both the Ruling and Opposition
Parties, have been requested to participate in this
effort. The first accepting MP has been Ms. Rabia
Bhuiyan, who shall write on The
Gender Balance in the Bangladesh Parliament. The
contributions of academia have also been considered
important. Prof. Abdul Hakim, Department of Political
Science, and Prof. Nizam Uddin Ahmed, Department of
Public Administration, both from the Chittagong
University, will respectively write on The
Transition of Governance in Bangladesh: From
Presidential Rule to Parliamentary System and on Parliamentary
Control over Public Expenditure in Bangladesh.
Finally, Mr. Manzoor Hasan, Barrister-at-Law, in
co-operation with Ms. Shanaz Huda of the Law Dept. of
Dhaka University, will produce the sixth monograph that
has been initiated, writing on The Bangladesh
Parliament and the Ratification of International
Covenants.
New
Titles to come
The
IPS has requested Members of the House, who have written
on theoretical constitutional matters, to honour the
Monograph Series with their participation. Suggested
titles go from the Role of the Speaker to the Functions
of the Opposition, and include topics related to the
Parliamentary Functions of the President, of the
Comptroller and Auditor General, the Party Discipline in
Parliament, the Amendments of the Constitution, Ethical
Standards of Parliamentarians and the Parliament
Secretariat.
IPS
Computer Training Needs Assessment
During the past
month of March, the Institute of Parliamentary Studies
has conducted a Training Needs Assessment focused on the
use and knowledge of computers among the Hon’ble
Members of Parliament and Officials of the Parliament
Secretariat. The assessment was conducted under the
professional direction of Dr. Murshed, Executive
Vice-President of Transvent Developers Consortium, the
sub-contractor hired by the “Strengthening
Parliamentary Democracy” Project for the set up of the
Computer Training Centre (in the IPS) and the Computer
Users’ Centre (in the Jatiya Sangsad Library). The
Needs Assessment was conceived as a tool to measure the
actual level and computer skills of the MPs and
Secretariat Officials.
Encouraging
Responses
A
large number of Hon’ble Members and Officials of the
Bangladesh Parliament Secretariat provided responses to
the questionnaire circulated to collect relevant
information. According to the responses, around 70% of
MPs believe that the use of computers is significant in
their professional work. Over 80% of the Members see its
main utility in dealing with the internet and e-mail,
while a similar percentage of the Secretariat Staff view
computers as a device for storage and retrieval of
information.
MPs
want to upgrade their computer knowledge
100% of the
respondents of both categories agreed that there is an
urgent need for computer orientation and training.
Members and Officials asked for an improvement of the
computer facilities in Parliament. This is a logic
consequence of the relatively recent use of computers:
more than the half of both categories did not use
information technology two years ago.
What
is the computer good for?
Following the
Assessment, the IPS is developing orientation courses
for MPs and training for Secretariat Staff in the areas
that have been highlighted as important by the
respondents. These include MS Word (Typing and Storing
Information), Internet and E-mail (Research and
Communication), MS Excel (Accounts, Budgets), as well as
Power Point (Presentations).
Current
IPS Activities
Institutionalisation
of the IPS
The
Bill for the IPS is currently awaiting approval from the
Cabinet. The Bill will provide for staff of the IPS to
be recruited and for the activities of the Institute to
be sustained on finalisation of the Bangladesh
Parliament/UNDP Project.
Training
Needs Assessment (TNA)
A
Training Needs Assessment has recently been completed.
One hundred and thirty structured questionnaires were
sent to selected officials of the Parliament Secretariat
and interviews were held with Hon. Members and Senior
Officials were also conducted.
On receipt of the completed questionnaires, the
data has been processed and analysed. A draft report,
highlighting the priority training need areas for
Secretariat Staff, as well as suggested orientation
activities for MPs, has been prepared and submitted for
the approval of the parliament authorities. The report
also incorporates detailed training modules and a
tentative training schedule.
Need
is widely felt
The
survey results show that 30% of
parliamentary officials have not received any
training in their entire service career. However, close
to 98% (97% male and 100% female) felt the need for
improving their job efficiency through training.
Job-related
Problems
Difficulties
experienced by staff in carrying out their duties were
indicated as the lack of delegation of responsibility
(47%), weaknesses in the work process (45%), problems
associated with using English (44%), and complications
in the decision-making process (39%).
Regarding
work atmosphere and morale, dissatisfaction is mainly
related to a lack of recognition by supervisors (66%), a
low level of friendliness (61%), and a lack of mutual
appreciation (58%). However, 83% of respondents do
consider their job to be satisfying.
Nearly
39% of respondents feel the need for intensive training
on Parliamentary Rules and Procedural matters, including
the law making process (49%), resolution and procedures
(42%), Standing Orders (41%), Sessional Orders (39%) and
Allocation of Business (33%).
Choice
of Trainers
Respondents
expressed a preference for having senior officials of
the Parliament Secretariat nominated to be trainers on
courses related to the Rules and Procedures (42%). Other
choices were for experienced parliamentarians from
Bangladesh (35%), experienced parliamentarians from
abroad (14%), senior academics (5%), and senior civil
servants (5%). The majority of the respondents prefer to
receive training with a mixed category of officials
(40%), while others indicated a preference for
department wise training
(29%) and wing wise training (22%). |
