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Parliamentary Administration: Why Does it Matter?

Australian and international perspectives on approaches to parliamentary administration

Dr June R Verrier, ANU

• The international debate about parliamentary administration

• A typology of parliaments

• The relevance of parliamentary administration

• Three models

• Examples and conclusions

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International consensus on a link between the style of a parliament’s administration and the quality of its democratic

achievement

Commonwealth/CPA initiatives:

• Latimer House Principles 2004- the relationship between the Executive, the

Legislature and the Judiciary

• Commonwealth Parliamentary Association /World Bank Institute Study Group Report on ‘Administering and Financing Parliament’, 2005,

- the need for a parliament’s budgetary independence of the

executive and the efficient management of that budget.

A parliament’s role: representation, legislation and scrutiny

Pre-requisites:• political will• appropriate machinery• adequate resources

This examination of parliamentary administration focuses on the last of these: the resources made available to a parliament and how these are organized, managed and controlled.

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Robinson and Mico’s Typology of Parliaments

Rubber Stamp Legislatures: (activity restricted to the ceremonial)

• No machinery or resources for independent scrutiny of the executive

Nascent Legislature:(recognition of the need for some support for MPs)

• A minimum/developing level of staff and resources

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Informed Legislatures:(capacity for scrutiny but qualified by dependence on resources

provided by the Executive)

• quality specialist staff, electronic access and data• committees, library and research service with a capacity for analysis

and generating alternative approaches

Independent Legislatures: (capacity for action completely independent of the assistance of

the Executive)

• budgetary autonomy• specialist expertise on staff and committees, in the library and the

research service, capable of producing long range projections and interdisciplinary analyses

• optimum electronic facilities

The Relevance of Parliamentary Administration

• Robinson and Mico’s matrix suggests that there is a correlation between the resources made available to a parliament and the quality of the parliamentary democracy which results

• The CPA has conclude that where power lies to decide what resources a parliament will have, and how those resources are organized, managed and controlled, is directly relevant to the democratic outcome of the parliament in question

Issue: as parliaments progress up the Robinson and Micoscale, the style of its administration may remain the same.

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Responsibilities of parliamentary administration include:

• building grounds and maintenance

• provision of services such as cleaning, catering and, increasingly, security

• organisation of travel arrangements for members coming and going to their electorates and for official visits

• increasingly sophisticated IT services

• in some cases, the management of MPs’ parliamentary allowances.

As parliaments move up the Robinson and Mico scale, parliamentary administration may come to include:

• hansard services• committee support services• parliamentary library research, analysis and advice

services• community outreach

That is, the responsibilities of parliamentary administration grow from the physical aspects of running a major national institution and move into the realm of what kind of parliament this could be on the democratic scale

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Because a link that has been made between the style of a parliament’s administration and its potential to be independent of the executive, a case has been made for the parliament itself to be ultimately responsible for its own administration.

Three models of parliamentary administration:• Organic• Commission• Corporate

Some examples (see organization charts provided)

• UK

• Canada

• New Zealand

• Australia: actual

• Australia: ideal

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Parliamentary Governance Key Indicators:

• budgetary control

• governance structure

• transparency

• control of ‘parliamentary pillars’

• whole-of-parliament perspective

Conclusions

– An independent democratic parliament is more likely to result from adequate resourcing and efficient parliamentary administration

– An effective parliamentary administration will be characterized by a machinery which gives MPs - the stakeholders - decision making power about the priorities to be set for the use of thoseresources

– Parliamentary officials must be constrained by the political andparliamentary system of which they are a part. As key advisers to Presiding Officers, they have a professional responsibility to be familiar with the options for developing parliamentary administration and their implications.

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Questions for participants:

• Where does your parliament sit on the Robinson and Mico scale?

• Which model of parliamentary administration looks most like yours?

• Is there a link between your two answers?