Written evidence submitted by the British Group of the Inter-Parliamentary Union
Executive Summary
About the British Group of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (BGIPU)
BGIPU has overall responsibility for the UK Parliament’s engagement with the IPU which is the global organisation of Parliaments and the world’s oldest international political organisation having been founded 125 years ago in 1889. BGIPU is governed by an Executive Committee appointed by its members with policy and administrative support from the BGIPU Secretariat. Membership of the BGIPU is open to all Members of the House of Commons and House of Lords and it currently has a membership of over 600 parliamentarians from both Houses, across all political parties and the cross-benches and some 200 Associate Members comprised of former Members of Parliament. The BGIPU is funded jointly by the House of Commons and the House of Lords with the primary aim of advancing the parliamentary dimension of Britain’s foreign relations.
2. The key focus of BGIPU’s inter-parliamentary activities is to promote and consolidate Britain’s interests abroad and engage UK Parliamentarians and their foreign counterparts in substantive exchanges on major global and bilateral issues. This task is undertaken through inter-parliamentary exchange visits, both in the Palace of Westminster and outward to counterpart parliaments, through multilateral and bilateral dialogue at IPU Assemblies, conferences and events, the convening of international parliamentary seminars on thematic issues of common concern and the broader promotion of the IPU core founding commitments to democracy, peace and security, human rights and the rule of law. The BGIPU also works to expand awareness and understanding of the parliamentary dimension of foreign relations and the contribution to be made by the UK Parliament to consolidate parliamentary democracy worldwide. BGIPU also supports the IPU’s efforts to ensure that there is greater parliamentary input to multilateral dialogue, particularly through the United Nations system where the IPU enjoys Permanent Observer status.
3. Our parent body the IPU, through its engagement with the multilateral system including the United Nations, encourages recognition of the importance of promoting parliamentary capacity building and bolstering democratic norms and institutions in the pursuit of international good governance, democracy and accountability objectives. To this degree, the IPU plays a very important and unique role as a parliamentary body able to set global standards for representative democracy, both in terms of encouraging good parliamentary practice and in providing well-researched and tested normative guidance to parliamentarians on a very wide range of international challenges, drawing on the real world experiences of the IPU’s global network of parliamentarians. This is not good governance as defined by academics or international civil servants but guidance directly provided by politicians, parliamentary practitioners and legislative experts.
BGIPU’s Role in Parliamentary Strengthening
4. In its own right, by engaging in inter-parliamentary diplomacy, visits and exchanges, BGIPU provides significant opportunities for parliamentarians from a wide diversity of countries to compare and contrast our respective parliamentary systems and draw examples and lessons for reform and parliamentary strengthening. This is one of the explicit objectives of our work which has the implicit benefit of promoting and improving democracy worldwide as a force for greater global peace and prosperity. In recent years, the BGIPU has undertaken targeted capacity-building activities with parliaments and parliamentarians in a range of post-conflict countries such as Somalia, Haiti, Sudan and Guinea-Bissau. We have also facilitated contact between the UK Parliament and the IPU Headquarters in Geneva on UK contributions to the joint UNDP/IPU Parliamentary Strengthening Project in Burma which has boosted the capacity of its legislature as part of broader advances along its path to democratic reform.
5. In addition to supporting capacity-building work by both Houses of Parliament, including in often initiating contacts with counterpart parliamentarians which leads to such requests for assistance, BGIPU have also supported the work of other bodies such as the UK Branch of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA UK), the Westminster Foundation for Democracy (WFD) and the US’s National Democratic Institute (NDI) in support of specific projects in a range of IPU member parliaments.
6. In focusing just on developing country parliaments, however, it should not be overlooked, that even in the context of bilateral inter-parliamentary exchanges with developed country parliaments, BGIPU’s activities provide opportunities for counterparts, and indeed UK parliamentarians as well, to learn more about alternative parliamentary systems and practices. This contributes to the broad scope of global parliamentary strengthening and raises standards of good parliamentary practice worldwide. By doing so, we contribute to the larger goal of encouraging the spread of democratic governance to all corners of the world, meeting the ever-expanding calls of people and communities for true enfranchisement and far better representation in how their countries are governed.
BGIPU’s Perspectives on Parliamentary Strengthening
7. In providing a submission to the International Development Committee, BGIPU expresses its strong support for the importance of parliamentary strengthening in developing countries as key development objective and, likewise, a key aim of inter-parliamentary activity. It is broadly accepted in international affairs that robust democratic parliaments are essential to ensuring fully inclusive political representation and such representation, in turn, acts as a stabilising force in managing the tensions and inequities which can often lead to conflict if left to propagate.
8. Indeed, representative parliaments have a vital role to play in underpinning the conditions necessary in a country for peace, prosperity and protection of individual and collective rights. It is recognised that parliaments are a vital component of national governance structures with the key functions of legislation, oversight and representation. In carrying out these functions, parliaments contribute to the overall objective of effective governance by strengthening state capability, ensuring accountability and providing responsiveness.
9. The quality of democracy in a country is inexorably linked to the effectiveness of parliamentary procedures, the efficacy of parliamentary structures and the skills of individual parliamentarians, the parliamentary leadership and parliamentary staff to carry out their roles. Where parliamentary structures fail, good governance cannot be possible due to the loss of appropriate checks and balances in the political systems involved. A country run by an effective executive government, without the democratic and legal constraints provided by a parliament or judiciary, is still a dictatorship whatever the services or benefits it is able to deliver to the populace. History shows that such authoritarian structures are rarely sustainable if not also indefensible in pursuit of basic human, political and economic rights.
10. In its important work establishing global norms for parliamentary democracy, the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), defines a democratic parliament by referring to universal values to which all legislatures should aspire if they are to retain their validity whatever the system of government. According to this definition outlined in its 2006 publication of good parliamentary and democratic practice (see below), a democratic parliament is: Representative by reflecting social and political diversity; Transparent in working in ways the public can see; Accessible so that the public, associations and movements of civil society can be involved; accountable to allow the electorate can hold members to account for their performance and Effective by being well organised to serve the needs of the population. In essence, Parliament is the central institution of democracy in representing society in all its diversity and embodying the will of the people, while holding government to account.
11. In most political systems, however, these norms are not met without significant work and persistence given the fluid nature of politics and the importance that the system can change and adapt over time to meet new demands and circumstances. There are also many factors why a parliament might fall short of its responsibilities as a result of a lack of commitment or skills by politicians or staff, ineffective or inefficient parliamentary procedures or structures or political forces at play which subvert the integrity of the parliamentary process. Given the high level of aspiration and the many obstacles faced, it is important that parliaments have support in the challenges they face from parliamentary counterparts and the international community more broadly in enabling them to meet aspirational norms that improve democracy and the quality of governance in their respective countries.
12. Nevertheless, in some countries, it will not always be in the short-term political interests of the government of the day to increase the capacity of parliament (given it is often a key source of opposition and criticism) so enabling them to be more closely held to account in their executive activities. This is always going to be a key tension in delivering this sort of assistance through inter-governmental mechanisms tied to the broader objectives of major donors. Also the scope of such assistance can sometimes reflect more of the objectives of the donor than the explicit needs of the recipient which often means limited follow-up once initial objectives are met.
13. Donors and international agencies also need to be careful that such efforts do not resort to simply trying to replicate their own political systems and modalities rather than contributing to the creation of a truly home-grown and sustainable institution in the recipient country. Developing countries often do not have the luxury of the centuries of history and procedural precedent enjoyed by the more mature democracies and the models formed in developed democracies are often reflective of the lessons drawn from our own historical failures and conflicts as much as our successes.
14. Generally, parliamentary strengthening has been seen more as a technical exercise to improved structures and procedures and to improve the skills of members and staff where external advice and expertise could be applied and, in due course, better outcomes would be achieved. Nevertheless, at times bitter experience has shown it is by no means this easy. Large sums of donor money have been poured into parliamentary programmes in many corners of the world for many years with little improvement and even, at times, significant backsliding on the quality of parliamentary structures and democratic outcomes.
15. While donors and parliaments in developed countries may have the skills and resources required, this is only part of the story. There is increasing appreciation that parliamentary strengthening is a difficult and highly sensitive area of development cooperation where significant change and broader institution-building cannot be achieved by external inputs alone. The key must be a desire for improvement and a commitment for reform from the parliament and country involved. Parliaments are not a private sector business or executive government department where radical improvements will flow from changed management procedures or a significant cash injection.
16. Parliaments are complex representations of the political structures and societies they represent and exist within. A will to change and reform must come from within and be managed at a pace which maintains institutional stability and is sensitive to the inherent political factors often at play. Parliamentary strengthening is a unique area of development work where the skills and knowledge required is best drawn from people with deep experience of parliamentary work, be they politicians themselves or parliamentary practitioners drawing on their own direct experiences.
The IPU’s current work on Common Principles for Parliamentary Support
17. Another complication is the wide diversity of development actors in the parliamentary strengthening field which causes unhealthy competition for projects and problems in coordination, cooperation and coherence. So while it would not be appropriate for BGIPU as an inter-parliamentary body working in the UK Parliament to provide definitive opinions on policy matters nor advise its views on where scarce public money should be spent, we do think it important to highlight the important role the IPU is playing in trying to shape the future of the international landscape for parliamentary strengthening. In addition to its past contributions to the field which has been very valuable, BGIPU particularly wish to highlight well advanced work underway to establish an agreed set of Common Principles for Parliamentary Support.
18. The Common Principles, currently under development, are the work of an expert group being coordinated by the IPU and the final outcomes will be taken up at the next IPU Assembly from 12-16 October 2014 in Geneva. BGIPU would be keen to convey to the Committee the Common Principles once formally adopted by the IPU Assembly (by the close of the 131st Assembly on 16 October 2014) which are intended to guide future international development work in the area. The Common Principles aim to provide a summary overview of what is most important and aspirational in parliamentary strengthening and support and a common language that all actors involved in this field can share. An essential aspect of the Common Principles is that parliaments should drive their own development agenda. Its first draft principle states in very simple terms the importance of parliamentary support and strengthening is saying, “Strong parliaments are essential to democracy and parliaments are entitled to the highest quality assistance in support of their own development”.
19. This most recent work draws on a significant body of past work in the field of parliamentary strengthening which includes both broad guides to good parliamentary practice but also specific thematic handbooks on key issues for parliamentarians such as people trafficking, child rights, asylum issues and a wide range of other topics which are widely praised and valued internationally. Of particular note is the IPU’s 2006 publication, “Parliament and democracy in the twenty-first century: A guide to good practice” which provides a comprehensive account of the central role that parliament in a democracy, identifying five key objectives: to be representative, transparent, accessible, accountable and effective and providing examples of good practice drawing on submissions from more than 75 national parliaments.
20. The related and subsequent 2008 publication, “Evaluating Parliament: A Self-Assessment Toolkit for Parliamentarians” aims to enable parliaments to evaluate their democratic performance against a set of criteria based on the above-mentioned values. The purpose is to help parliaments to identify their strengths and weaknesses against international criteria, in order to determine priorities for strengthening the parliamentary institution. Both documents deserve greater attention from other institutions working in the field of parliamentary strengthening given the risk of simply “re-inventing the wheel” when new players enter the field or when old ones try to assert primacy of ownership.
The value of Westminster as a resource for Parliamentary Strengthening
21. In terms of the value of the Westminster brand, there remains a very strong international appetite for Westminster’s expertise through the involvement of the UK Parliament and other UK institutions including BGIPU itself, in parliamentary strengthening work. This stems from Westminster’s widely acknowledged and recognised expertise and the very long history of parliamentary democracy in the UK which is seen by many countries as an inspiration if not also providing the historical origins of their own respective system. Many experts in the UK are seen as world-leaders in the field of parliamentary democracy and our Parliament’s procedures are often seen as well advanced and instructive for other parliament’s to study, a factor often reflected in the requested elements of the programs BGIPU organise for counterparts.
22. The fact the UK has a relatively diffuse and disconnected set of bodies, within parliament and outside, including through BGIPU, the UK Branch of the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (CPA UK), through the work of the Overseas Offices of both Houses of Parliament, the activities of the Westminster Foundation for Democracy (WFD) and government contributions through both the FCO and DFID, does not seem to detract from demands for our expertise although it does make it somewhat more difficult to access. Making sense of this diversity and ensuring our assistance is coordinated among UK government and parliamentary bodies and relevant institutions and with other key international players remains a key challenge to be addressed by policy makers in government and within parliamentary bodies themselves.