News from the parliamentary monitoring community:
In Argentina, CIPPEC, with support of a public TV channel, organized a series of dialogues between young voters and five candidates running to become Mayor of Buenos Aires. To increase reach, each dialogue was broadcast using Google Hangouts and provided opportunities for interaction over social networks.
In Germany, Parliament Watch won a lawsuit calling on the parliament to disclose information on lobbyists who have registered with the Bundestag.
In Uganda, Parliament Watch released a report entitled “Assessment of the Accountability Committees of Parliament”. The assessment found that accountability committees struggle to review and respond to Auditor General reports in a timely manner, creating a large backlog of reports. The assessment concludes with a number of institutional, administrative, and political recommendations to help accountability committees deal with these challenges.
In Croatia, GONG and Code for Croatia launched a new website that allows citizens to request information from more than 6000 public authorities, including the Croatian Parliament.
In Norway, Holder de Ord launched Sagt i Salen (Said in the Parliament), a new feature that shows how many times a certain word has been used in parliamentary debate. This tool facilitates political speech analysis by showing how many times a word has been used in a given year, by a political party, or by an individual MP.
In Ghana, the Center for Democratic Development began to implement a project called “Building Transparency, Participation and Feedback around Local Government Budgeting and Planning Systems.” The project aims to promote change in “attitudes and behaviors of both the Assembly staff and the citizenry for improved transparency and accountability in the management of local revenue.”
In Georgia, Transparency International released a policy brief calling for the creation of a verification system that would review public officials’ asset declarations. Evidence gathered by TI suggests that a verification system would help ensure that public officials’ asset declarations are complete and accurate. TI also released and assessment of Georgia’s national integrity system.
In Tunisia, Al Bawsala issued a press release with recommendations for improving the draft right to information bill that is currently being considered by the parliament.
In The UK, Open Knowledge Foundation opened a public consultation to gather input on public datasets that should be evaluated in the forthcoming edition of the Global Open Data Index. The Index evaluates the availability and openness of key pieces of public information, including the government budget, election results, and legislation.
In The Netherlands, Open State Foundation added more FOI requests, documents, and desicions in its openwob.nl website, which allows users to easily search a database of more than 9000 official documents from different government authorities.
In Europe, Transparency International Europe released two new tools for monitoring lobbying activity in the European Commission.
Other related news:
A new proposal being discussed in the Colombian Congress would increase the availability of information about members of congress. Among other things, the proposal would require MPs to disclose resumes of their staff, reports about their performance, and information on conflicts of interest.
Members, committees, and staff in the US House of Representatives are now able to use open source software when conducting official business.
The Governance Data Alliance was recently launched. The alliance is an effort to promote coordination and sharing among governance data producers and to increase relevance and reuse of governance data.
The Scottish Government opened consultation on proposals to introduce a lobbying transparency bill.
The National Transparency System was recently launched in Mexico. This government’s system seeks to increase transparency and access to information by improving coordination among different levels of government and oversight agencies.
A recent study by Twaweza in Tanzania shows that the majority of citizens support an access to information law; they also believe that this could be a great tool for fighting corruption.
The National Archives and Records Administration Office is reaching out to the public for feedback on how to modernize freedom of information efforts.
Resources:
With the aim of facilitating access to and usability of electoral data, NDI recently launched the Open Election Data Initiative. This website includes relevant information about electoral processes, open data principles, and examples from Latin America on how to use of this type of data.
A new tool to visualize open data from all over Africa was recently launched.
Civicus released a new report that reviews assaults on freedom of association, expression and assembly. The report raises serious concerns about civic space in 96 countries.
Upcoming Events:
The Western Balkans Open Government Dialogue will be held on September 10 to 11 in Tirana, Albania.
Registration for TransparencyCamp, Sunlight Foundation’s annual unconference, is now open. The unconference will take place on September 11 to 12 in Washington, D.C.
The Code for America Summit 2015 – “Transforming 21st Century Government” – is happening September 30 to October 2 in Oakland, California.
Novagov Congress 2015 will be an opportunity to discuss recent innovations in the public sector in Ibero-america including best practices and success stories in increasing public service ethics. The congress will be held on October 5 to 6 in Tenerife, Spain.
Registration for the Online Seminar on Iberoamerican Experiences on Legislative Transparency are open. The Organization of American States will cover the cost of participation for selected participants. The seminar will be held October 14 to 30.
The Open Government Partnership’s Global Summit will take place in Guadalajara, Mexico on October 27-29. Pre-registration is open now.