Delegates include members of parliament, parliamentary staff, auditors general and audit office staff from Bangladesh, Ghana, Indonesia, Laos, Malawi, Nigeria, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka, Tanzania and Thailand.
The seminar has been organised by the La Trobe University Public Sector Governance and Accountability Research Centre. It is sponsored by the World Bank Institute, Commonwealth Parliamentary Association and the Centre for Democratic Institutions.
Centre Director, Adjunct Professor Peter Loney – former Deputy Speaker of the Victorian Legislative Assembly – said the program involves visits to parliaments in Melbourne, Canberra and Sydney as well as six days in residence on the University’s Beechworth campus.
Sessions will be led by Professor Loney, Professor Kerry Jacobs of the ANU, Dr Rick Stapenhurst from the World Bank Institute, former Victorian Treasurer, the Hon Tony Sheehan, and Andrew Imlach from the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association.
The seminar focuses on budgets, from the secrecy surrounding their preparation and presentation to the responsibilities of legislatures in their final approval. It looks at the roles of upper houses, second chambers, and state and provincial legislatures in influencing budgets – and that of parliamentary committees in scrutinising them.
One session – featuring a topic that still resonates from one of Australia’s most controversial political events – will examine what happens if budget approval is withheld or delayed: ‘is the confidence of Parliament always involved in voting on a Budget or amendments to it?’
Another, on public officials and parliamentary committees, deals with the bureaucracy’s perspective on appearing before oversight committees and the challenges for parliamentarians of such attitudes by the bureaucracy. It also examines whether the Westminster convention of ministerial responsibility is still a reasonable expectation in the 21st century.
Thursday, 8 February 2007 International seminar on how to achieve stronger parliamentsLa Trobe University from this Sunday, 11 February, hosts a ten-day seminar for more than 50 senior government figures from a dozen nations on the topic of strengthening parliamentary processes through financial scrutiny.