This is an extract of the Report of the Independent Panel Assessment of Parliament, January 13 2009. The panel was chaired by Pregs Govender and included Selby Baqwa, Colin Eglin, Judith February, John Kane-Berman, Papati Robert Malavi, Koko Mashigo, Aubrey Matshiqi, Sipho Seepe, Max Sisulu, and Frederick van Zyl Slabbert.

Chapter 2: Parliament's Legislative Mandate

The Panel recommends that:

• Parliament establishes a scrutiny mechanism to oversee delegated legislation. Once established, a monitoring and evaluation schedule must be developed to ensure that the scrutiny mechanism for delegated legislation effectively fulfils its role.

• Parliament should make greater use of mechanisms such as conferral (joint committees), which allow committees to jointly engage with legislation that touches on the mandate of a number of committees.

• Review of the Impact of Legislation

• Parliament should ensure that it develops the necessary skills and capacity (both among Members of Parliament and staff) to effectively monitor the impact of legislation, both before and after its adoption.

• The Panel recommends that an Impact Assessment Report on the likely impact of each Bill should be attached when the Bill is tabled in Parliament. The Executive should be required to undertake such assessments before the Bill is tabled in Parliament. This report 1.) must examine the relevant and likely budgetary, financial, economic, administrative, social, gender, environmental and other impacts if the Bill in question is enacted; 2.) should further explain clearly the scope of any law-making and other powers being delegated to ministers or officials, and why it is thought necessary to delegate; 3.) should also clearly set out the criteria in terms of which any discretionary powers are to be exercised; 4.) should summarise all submissions (written and oral) from outside bodies regarding the Bill and contain the Department's response to each of these submissions. The parliamentary committee processing the Bill should in turn respond to all submissions made to it.

• The impact of legislation must also be monitored after its enactment.

Such monitoring by Parliament must consider inter alia: unintended consequences of legislation, failure by the Executive or other organs of state to take required actions in response to legislation, and the extent to which the objectives and implementation targets of legislation is achieved.

• Careful consideration must be given to cost, administrative and other implications of legislation before enactment in order to assess the feasibility of implementing legislation.

• The objectives and implementation targets of legislation should be clearly expressed in order to facilitate Parliament's role in monitoring the impact of legislation.

• Parliament should explore the reasons behind the institution's poor record in initiating legislation and address capacity gaps that contributes to this.

• Parliament should urgently address the outstanding legislation identified in chapter 2 of this report.

Chapter 3: Parliament's Oversight Mandate

The Panel recommends that:

• The impact of the party list electoral system as it is currently structured in South Africa, as well as potential alternative systems, should be given consideration by Parliament. The view of the Panel is that the current electoral system should be replaced by a mixed system which attempts to capture the benefits of both the constituency-based and proportional representation electoral systems.

• An extensive monitoring schedule must be put in place to ensure that the recommendations of the Oversight Model find expression in Parliamentary processes.

The development of new oversight mechanisms identified by the Model should equally be monitored.

• The existing process which seeks to develop an attendance policy for Members of Parliament should be reinvigorated and finalised.

• The Panel recommends that Parliament take steps to improve the quality of reports emanating from parliamentary committees in order to minimise the number of cases where reports are noted rather than adopted due to the unsatisfactory quality of the report.

• The process through which the National Assembly and National Council of Provinces monitors responses to Parliamentary recommendations stemming from its reports should be improved.

• The Panel strongly recommends that the system through which Executive responses to COPA reports are tracked should be strengthened, both procedurally and administratively, to ensure that it functions effectively.

• The Panel recommends that Parliament should consider the lessons that emerged through the arms deal investigation process.

Parliament should continue to exercise its oversight role with regard to the arms deal, relating specifically to current issues such as the implementation and impact of offset commitments.

• The Panel recommends that Parliament should revisit the arms deal and take such steps as are necessary, including a debate on the adoption of a resolution calling for the appointment of a judicial commission of enquiry into the arms deal.

• Two detailed reports on the NCOP's role and functions were published in 2004, namely Speeding Transformation: Monitoring and Oversight in the NCOP and NCOP Second Term 1999-2004. These reports provide detailed analysis and make several recommendations which the Panel found to be still relevant.

The Panel therefore proposes that Parliament engages with these reports and gives detailed consideration to the recommendations contained therein.

• While respecting the independence of Institutions Supporting Democracy, Parliament must endeavour to make better use of the information emanating from these institutions in the exercise of its oversight mandate by engaging with reports emanating from these institutions. The Panel further recommends that Parliament engages with the recommendations of the report of the ad hoc Committee on the Review of Chapter 9 and Associated Institutions.

Chapter 4: Mandate to Serve as a Forum for the Public Consideration of Issues

The Panel recommends that:

• Parliament should take steps to improve the quality and substance of debate within the institution in order to increase the efficacy of Parliament in fulfilling its constitutional function of providing a forum for debate of issues of national importance.

• The mechanism through which the Speaker of the National Assembly engages with the Leader of Government Business to follow up on unanswered questions must be assessed and revised to ensure that the Executive is effectively held to account for unanswered questions.

• Parliament must develop a media strategy to ensure that the institution's engagement with the media contributes to public awareness of debates taking place within Parliament.

• The Panel notes that the topics of debate in the NCOP do not always reflect a specific focus on the challenges faced by citizens on provincial and local level, and recommends that the NCOP adopt a more focused approach in terms of its specific mandate.

• Parliament should strive to timeously debate current matters of public concern.

Chapter 5: Public Participation

The Panel recommends that:

• The structures and processes around constituency work should be comprehensively reviewed and assessed.

Furthermore:

• The development of the Parliamentary Public Participation Model must include detailed consideration of the constituency system, the responsibilities of constituency work, and how these structures and processes relate to the newly established Parliamentary Democracy Offices.

• The consideration of the impact of the electoral system on the independence and effectiveness of Parliament which was proposed in chapter three must also give due consideration to the influence of the electoral system on the accountability and responsiveness of Parliament to the electorate.

• The Panel recommends that the systems to ensure financial accountability for the substantial funds allocated to political parties for constituency support are improved.

• Parliament should provide the public with information regarding constituency offices, such as: the address and contact details of constituency offices, the names and contact details of Members of Parliament assigned to specific constituency offices, and the boundaries of constituency areas.

• The reach and impact of the public education projects of the Public Affairs Section should be reviewed;

• Similarly, the reach and impact of public participation initiatives such as "Taking Parliament to the People" and the Women's Parliament should be carefully reviewed to ensure that such initiatives result in tangible outcomes, including feedback to participating individuals and communities. It is necessary to review the process whereby issues raised during these events are referred to relevant committees so that they may be incorporated into formal parliamentary processes.

• Parliament should develop a guidebook to cover the principles and requirements of the public hearing process directed to chairpersons and members of committees.

• Parliament should ensure that feedback is provided to members of the public and institutions that have made presentations to Parliament through public participation processes.

• The Public Participation Model should provide clear standards for public participation; these standards will provide the courts with a clear framework for assessing cases involving the public participation responsibilities of Parliament.

Chapter 6: Parliamentary Service

The Panel recommends that:

• Parliament should ensure that the expansion of research services contributes directly to a more effective institution through actively promoting research services to Members of Parliament and parliamentary committees.

• Increased emphasis should be placed on the training that researchers receive on

integrating a gender analysis in the research of every Committee.

• Parliament should urgently assess the information management processes and challenges in the Committee Section, relating specifically to the drafting and record-keeping of minutes and reports. It may be necessary to conduct an audit of documents in order to effectively catalogue minutes and other documents currently held in the Committee Section.

• The relationship between the Research Unit and the Committee Section must be assessed to ensure coordinated support to committees.

• The systems and processes involved in the production and delivery of transcriptions must be assessed to improve the delivery time of transcriptions. The Language Service should commit itself to a standard delivery time for transcripts; a period of 24 hours is proposed for unedited transcripts. The Panel further recommends that the soft-cover Hansard transcriptions should be published, speedily, on at least a quarterly basis during the parliamentary session.

• The Panel notes that, while funding for support to Members of Parliament and committees has increased, the administrative and secretarial support has not increased commensurately. Parliament should investigate this issue to ensure that increased financial resources result in tangible benefits in terms of support to Members and committees.

• The Panel proposes that the recommendations of the internal report on multilingualism be considered and appropriate steps taken to address the identified challenges, these include:

• Bills in Parliament are produced in only two languages, one of which is

English; Parliament should ensure that translations of a greater number of official languages are produced.

• Parliament does not currently oversee the multilingual compliance within executive departments and other organs of state; mechanisms should be established to undertake this function.

• Parliament's translation capacity for some of the most widely used international languages should be increased in order to support Parliament's increasing international activity.

• In the view of the Panel adequate legal drafting capacity is essential in ensuring the independence of Parliament, and therefore proposes that the expansion of the Legal Services Office should be pursued as a priority.

• The Panel notes that a guidebook for Members of Parliament on their roles and responsibilities has been developed. It is important that this guidebook be made available in all official languages as well as braille.

Chapter 7: Institutional Growth and Development

The Panel recommends that:

• Parliament should develop mechanisms and improve capacity to support its role in the negotiation and ratification of international treaties.

• Parliament should establish mechanisms to monitor South Africa's reporting obligations resulting from international agreements to ensure timeous reporting.

• Parliament's international activities must be well prepared, goal-oriented, and result in clearly defined outcomes.

• Ethics

• There is a need for greater detail in Parliament's ethics framework, as well as the development of guidelines to ensure absolute clarity regarding the ethical standards of Parliament.

• Currently Parliament has no clear guidelines on post-tenure restrictions. Parliament should urgently develop such guidelines.

• In the view of the Panel any Member of Parliament who is convicted of corruption, fraud or similar offences should be ineligible to serve as a Member of Parliament.

• In view of the above and the comments by the Panel on the "unconditional power of political parties to remove their members from Parliament", Parliament should establish a task team to investigate the revision of the conditions under which a Member of Parliament may cease to be eligible to hold his/her position, as outlined in section 47 of the Contsitution of South Africa.

• Gender and Parliament

• Parliament needs to link public participation events such as the Women's Parliament to Parliament's legislative program to enable women to learn about Bills that may potentially undermine their rights.

• Parliament should ensure that clear codes, procedures, guidelines and training around sexual harassment are developed for staff and MPs so that all those who work within the precincts of Parliament are equally protected against any infringements of their rights.

• All international agreements that Government signs and ratifies must be scrutinised for their impact on women and gender equality.

• Parliament should use its power to reinstate Government's commitment in its 1998/1999 National Budget Review, to ensure that the entire budget would eventually be gender responsive.

• Parliament must guard the independence and integrity of its Committees and ensure that what happened to this Committee's 2001 HIV/Aids Report is not repeated.

• Parliament needs to support the Joint Monitoring Committee on the Quality of Life and Status of Women to ensure that it is able to influence legislation that seems to negatively impact on women's lives, such as the Communal Land Rights Act and the Traditional Courts Bill.

• Parliament should institutionalize symposiums for Chairpersons of parliamentary committees to develop a common understanding of the importance of ensuring that legislation, including the budget, is gender-responsive.

• In addressing electoral reform, Parliament will need to address the question of how to ensure that any such reform does not further entrench the racist, sexist and ethnic prejudice and divides that continue to plague South Africa.

• Leadership of Parliament - the Panel considers the various options in the structuring of parliamentary leadership to be a matter which should be pursued on an institutional and political level.

• During the Panel's deliberations it was observed that a conflict of interest may exist, or may be seen by the public to exist, when a Presiding Officer of one of the Houses of Parliament simultaneously holds a senior position within a political party. In certain political systems the speaker or chairperson of the house is required to resign from senior party political posts for the duration of their appointment. The Panel recommends that Parliament gives serious consideration to this issue.

• There is a disjuncture between the resources allocated to constituency work and tangible outcomes. Parliament should assess the impact of its expenditures on constituency support and significantly improve procedures for accountability by political parties for these funds.

• Parliament's efforts to promote knowledge of the institution and its processes among the public are essential to deepen and strengthen South Africa's democracy, as well as increase the legitimacy of the institution in the eyes of the public. For this reason the reduction in the budget allocated for public affairs is of concern and should be investigated.

The full report can be found at www.parliament.gov.za