Areas of Expertise

Effective parliamentary monitoring of government expenditures (parliamentary oversight) is important because it ensures that the legislative branch monitors how the executive branch spends public funds. To paraphrase the UN Office of Internal Oversight Services (OIOS), the purpose of governmental oversight is to ensure responsible administration of resources, a culture of accountability and transparency, and improved programme performance.

Corruption flourishes when legislatures are ineffective in ensuring effective monitoring and democratic accountability for government operations and performance. A professional public service, laws, the judicial system, and the media also play important roles, but the legislature provides the leadership, visibility and authority to ensure transparency, accountability and integrity.

In performing their oversight functions legislatures are usually assisted by a Supreme Audit Institution (SAI): an external control body that audits the way government spends public funds and reports the results to the legislature. Within the legislature, there is usually a committee or subcommittee responsible for interaction with the SAI and for considering its reports.

In Eastern Europe the capacity of legislatures to check abuses by the executive remains weak. Accustomed to playing a rubber-stamp role during the Soviet era, many legislatures lacked the necessary ability to perform an oversight function. Only recently have legislatures begun to assert their legislative and oversight roles. The working capacity of SAIs is often weak and in some cases SAIs have not been established yet. Many legislatures are also lacking sufficient capacity to consider SAI audit reports and to take subsequent action to hold governments accountable for misuse of public funds and to influence them to improve their policies. For this reason, strengthening legislative oversight capacity is seen as vital to the Centre's work with parliaments in Eastern Europe.

What We Do

Types of assistance we provide:

(1) Assistance provided in strengthening parliamentary oversight by strengthening the linkages between Parliament and Supreme Audit Institutions:

Assistance provided to parliaments to build the capacity to hold hearings and act on audit reports of Supreme Audit Institutions;
Assistance to Supreme Audit Institutions to develop and employ performance auditing methodology;
Assistance in preparing a legislative base for introducing performance auditing;

(2) Assistance in the development of ombudsman's institutions.

Results Achieved

Under a pilot project implemented within the Canada-Russia Parliamentary Program the Parliamentary Centre assisted the Accounting Chamber of the Russian Federation in developing performance audit methodology that was employed in two pilot audits, the results of which were reviewed by the appropriate Federal Assembly Committees. The Parliamentary Centre assisted also in building and strengthening the capacity of the Federal Assembly, in particular of the Federation Council Commission on Interaction with the Accounting Chamber, to interact with the Accounting Chamber and to review its performance audit reports.

In support of Bulgaria's commitment to increasing accountability and transparency, the Parliamentary Centre assisted the Bulgarian National Assembly and the anti-corruption group Coalition 2000 in the development of an ombudsman's institution…more.

Currently, under our Southeast Europe Parliamentary Program we are assisting in the establishment of a State Audit Institution in Serbia.

Products/Resources

An Overview of the Canadian Budget Process. Amelita A. Armit , Program Director, Asia and Eastern Europe, Parliamentary Centre 2005

Interaction between the External Auditor and Internal Auditors: the Canadian Experience David Rattray, Senior Associate, Parliamentary Centre

The Applicability of Canada's Experience for the Development of Parliamentary Oversight in Russia. Geoff Dubrow, Program Director, Eastern Europe, Parliamentary Centre

Performance Auditing and Accountability: Canadian and Russian Experience.Geoff Dubrow, Program Director, Eastern Europe, Parliamentary Centre

Interaction between the External Auditor and Organs of Internal control: The Canadian Experience. Ron Thompson, Assistant Auditor General of Canada

The Auditor and the Legislator. The Canadian Experience: Interaction between Parliament And Organs of External Control, Ron Thompson, Assistant Auditor General of Canada

The Canada-Russia Parliamentary Program Pilot Project – The Perspective of Office of the Auditor General, David Rattray, Assistant Auditor General of Canada

Performance Audit Reports of the Russian Accounting Chamber Produced Under the Canada-Russia Parliamentary Program:
- Report on audit of the implementation of the federal targeted program "Children of the North"
- Report on audit of the implementation of the federal targeted program “Social Support to the Disabled”

A Comparison between the Office of the Auditor General of Canada and the Accounting Chamber of the Russian Federation

Administrative and Financial Resource Management in Parliament

Appropriate administrative and financial management in parliament is the key to ensuring that parliamentarians and parliamentary administration put to best use the resources available for their functioning. In addition, stronger and well-organized internal financial controls within legislatures help to ensure that legislatures not only advocate good governance and accountability, but also practice it. In this regard developing and executing an internal parliamentary budget is a key to establishing control over the allocation and spending of the available resources.

Canada’s Parliament has a long tradition in managing its financial resources with both Chambers having a body responsible for internal administrative matters, including internal financial control (the Board of Internal Economy in the House of Commons and the Standing Committee on Internal Economy, Budgets and Administration in the Senate).

Parliaments in East Europe are at different stages of developing their internal administrative and financial resource management. Some have yet to develop and execute their first internal parliamentary budgets and to establish internal management bodies while others are more advanced in this regard. A problem common for many legislatures in the region is that they operate with relatively limited funds and in the same time deal with heavy workloads: thus they are faced with the need to seek maximum efficiency in using the available resources. Closely related to this is the need to develop new or improve existing control mechanisms in order to ensure that parliamentarians and parliamentary staff are spending funds available to them in a proper and efficient manner.

What We Do

Assistance in reforming the internal administrative and financial management in parliament;
Assistance to parliaments in establishing and building the working capacity of internal management bodies (committees/commissions on internal economy);
Assistance in building parliaments’ capacity to establish and manage internal parliamentary budgets;
Assistance in reforming the provision of administrative support to parliamentarians, based on the experience of the Parliament of Canada;

Under the Canada-Russia Parliamentary Program (CRPP) the Parliamentary Centre assisted the upper chamber of the Russian Federal Assembly, the Federation Council, in reforming its internal administrative and financial management after it was transformed into a full-time body in the beginning of 2002. Under CRPP, the experience of the Canadian Senate’s Standing Committee on Internal Economy was used in the establishment of a Commission of Internal Economy in the Federation Council. The Centre assisted the newly-established body in introducing in the Federation Council a system of support for parliamentarians, similar to the model used in the Senate of Canada, where Senators are alocated personal budgets that they can use to meet their particular needs and priorities.

Assistance in reforming the internal administrative and financial management in both chambers of the Russian Federal Assembly (the Duma and the Federation Council) will continue under the new Accountability Strengthening Program.

Products/Resources

Overview of the Processes for Managing the Budgets of Committees of the Canadian Parliament John McCrea, Senior Associate, Parliamentary Centre

Overview on Financial Management in Canadian Parliament John McCrea, Senior Associate, Parliamentary Centre

Comparison of the Senate’s Standing Committee on Internal Economy, Budgets and Administration (COIE), the House of Common’s Board of Internal Economy (BOIE) and the Russian Federation Council’s Commission of Internal Economy

Human Resource Management in Parliament

A well-organized, non-partisan, professional and administrative staff is instrumental for securing the efficient functioning of any parliament. Staff are the “institutional memory” of legislatures providing invaluable support, without which parliamentarians’ capacity to perform their duties would be severely limited.

Staff capacity in many parliaments in Southeast Europe remains low, especially in terms of providing research services and expert non-partisan advice to Parliamentarians. Staff are generally inflexible, and lack the needed professionalism and knowledge. To a great extent, this is a legacy of the Communist period when parliamentary staff roles did not extend beyond basic administrative support.

What we do

Assistance in enhancing parliamentary secretariats’ capacity to provide effective non-partisan, professional, and administrative services to parliamentarians.

The Centre’s Canada-Russia Parliamentary Program included a training program for staff in the two chambers of Russia's Federal Assembly (the State Duma and the Federation Council). At the federal level, study visits were organized for almost 100 deputies and staff from the Russian Federal Assembly. CRPP contributed to the drafting and revising of a Federal Assembly Law and legislation on parliamentary employment as well as to improving management practices, including organizational restructuring, developing training programs for middle and senior managers, establishing an open competitive process and changing employee appraisals.

In Serbia, the Southeast Europe Parliamentary Program works to enhance the parliamentary secretariat’s overall capacity to provide effective, non-partisan, and professional administrative services to the National Assembly, its Committees, and Members in carrying out their duties.

In May 2004, the Parliamentary Centre was sub-contracted by a Canadian management consultation firm, Universalia, to organize a two-week visit to Ottawa by a delegation comprising parliamentary staff from the two chambers of the Russian Parliamentary Assembly. The delegation came under the CIDA-funded Governance Advisory and Exchange Program. The delegation studied institutional support services in the Parliament of Canada and identified several areas of the Canadian model that are potentially implementable in the Russian Federal Assembly, including the Library of Parliament model which serves committees through an efficient use of human resources; and the House of Commons’ employee classification and evaluation systems.

Products/Resources

How a Parliamentary Legislative Employment Framework Can Contribute to Effective and Efficient Human Resources Management, Jacques Sabourin, Senior Associate, Parliamentary Centre

The Legal Framework for Human Resources in the Parliament of Canada, Mark Audcent, Law Clerk and Parliamentary Counsel, Senate of Canada

Support to Parliamentary Committees

Description

In most parliamentary assemblies, committees are delegated with the authority to examine and inquire into matters referred to them by the Assembly and to report back to the plenary. It is through this mechanism that parliaments are able to effectively manage the multitude of issues before them, including calling upon expert witnesses and examining documents, analysing each line (clause) of proposed legislation, and providing detailed analysis of departmental spending.

When committees lack sufficient information or resources, the ability of MP’s to provide effective and timely advice to the Assembly, or proper oversight of the executive, is severely limited. The Parliamentary Centre recognizes the key role that committees play within legislatures, and works with parliaments to develop programs to assist committees in meeting their requirements.

What we Do

Assistance in providing professional, non-partisan research support to parliamentary committees

Results Achieved

In Serbia, the National Assembly has engaged a full-time researcher to assist the working group on the development of a Law on the creation of a State Audit Institution (SAI). The researcher is an expert in this field and will provide professional advice and information to Members through the working group. Since the Serbian National Assembly currently has no professional legislative drafting capacity, the researcher, who is also an experienced legislative drafter, will also provide support to the working group in drafting the new law.

In Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Parliamentary Assembly has established a Research Centre to support the Budget and Finance committees and the Legal/Constitutional committees of both Houses (House of Peoples and House of Representatives) . The Research Centre consists of three full-time staff, including an economist, a lawyer and a political scientist. The mandate of the Research Centre is to assist in providing analysis of the reports of the State Audit Institution, provide legislative drafting and analysis of legislation, and other professional research analysis and reports as required. Already the demand for these services indicates that it is a significant enhancement to the work of Members on committees.

International Parliamentary Networks

We have experience in establishing and managing inter-parliamentary networks focusing on anti-corruption and good governance.

The Parliamentary Centre serves as the Global Secretariat for the Global Organization of Parliamentarians Against Corruption (GOPAC) which is an international network of over 250 Parliamentarians from 72 countries of the world, organized by region to build integrity and promote effective governance.




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