REGIONAL ACTIVITIES

SLIP Annual Partners Strategy meeting and Regional Exchange (February 26-28, 2020)

Annual Strategy meeting: UNDP organised an annual strategy meeting with SLIP partner countries in Nadi, Fiji from February 26-28, 2020. All five focus countries had confirmed their participation, however, with the global outbreak of COVID-19, the Governments of the Republic of Marshal Island (RMI) and Samoa instituted travel bans on their public officials, which limited their participation. UNDP was still able to collect their priorities and suggestions via email, Zoom and phone conversations and accordingly adopted the annual strategy plan for them.

‘In the last two decades, UNDP is the only organization which provided concrete support to FSM Congress. Through this support, the Senators are more engaged than ever before. We have also been able to move important institutional reforms, such the sexual harassment policy.’, Lam Dang, Chief Legislative Officer, FSM Congress.

During the strategy meeting, UNDP organised bilateral meetings with the delegates from the Solomon Islands and the Federated States of Micronesia. During the bilateral meetings, UNDP discussed country priorities with the respective parliaments and took stock of the progress made to date. Later, the participants were brought together for planning regional activities for 2020, whereby UNDP presented the project’s achievements in the year 2019 and outlined regional plans for 2020. The team also discussed the outbreak of the COVID-19 and potential impact it might have on the activities. Participants were reminded that the year 2020 was the last year of the project. Hence, we needed to work proactively to implement all agreed activities. In all, five persons (two females and three males) participated in these meetings.

Exchange on Parliamentary Secretariats: As part of the strategy meeting, UNDP arranged a technical dialogue on the ‘role of parliamentary secretariats in the effective and efficient functioning of parliaments’. Delegates from Fiji, Guam and Palau also joined this part of the meeting with FSM and the Solomon Islands participants. During the exchanges, representatives engaged in interactive discussions on good practices, practical solutions and challenges related to the following topics:

• The Role of parliamentary secretariats.

• The Role of the Clerk’s office in secretariat services.

• Assessing and responding to the needs of parliamentarians.

• Ensuring a resourceful secretariat, including staff capacity building.

• Providing active research and library services.

• Legislative drafting and its role.

A representative of the Embassy of Japan to Fiji also participated in the meeting and thanked all delegates for their dedicated efforts for improving parliamentary services in the Pacific region.

Overall, 11 delegates (three males and eight females) participated in the exchange, besides UNDP and the Embassy staff. The Speaker of the Legislature of Guam chaired the opening and closing of the sessions and communicated appreciation for UNDP and the Government of Japan for affording such a unique opportunity to help to build stronger parliaments and a greater Pacific community. “In the process of just talking to the countries represented here this week, I have found the exchange vital for strengthening Pacific parliaments,” said Speaker of the 35th Legislature of Guam , Senator Tina Rose Muna Barnes, at the closing of the strategy meeting.

“Therefore, it is that much more vital that we continue to come together with these types of meetings so we can learn from one another, strategise, and find solutions that each of our islands has for dealing with similar situations.

“By empowering ourselves, prioritising our needs as island people, we truly will build resilient island communities.”

She added, “We are very grateful to UNDP and the Government of Japan for convening this meeting.”

While the pandemic presented challenges for operations, it also showed some important opportunities for beefing up technical assistance to the Pacific parliaments. As parliaments globally had to continue their operations to both support response packages and oversight government actions, many new good and bad practices emerged within the parliamentary field. Using these as important test cases, UNDP planned and started a webinar series to promote the exchange of good regional and global practices and share the examples which should not be followed. The webinar series was rolled out with the following objectives:

• Facilitate an exchange on emerging good practices on continuing legislative functions to respond to the Pandemic situation;

• Facilitate the sharing of knowledge on ICT tools and solutions deployed to facilitate business continuity;

• Draw lessons learned which could be applied to other emergencies (e.g. cyclones and tsunamis) within the Pacific and in other SIDS countries;

• Document and publish good practices, lessons learnt and ICT tools for replication in a future crisis.

A total of four online discussions (webinars) were hosted by the project focusing on a range of topics:

• 19th June 2020: “COVID-19 Crisis: Parliamentary Innovation and Response during the Pandemic” The first webinar allowed the participants to highlight strategic factors which led Parliaments to react to the crisis, as well as aspects that can be replicated or avoided during any future crises. Overall, around 50 participants from across 18 the Pacific Parliaments including Cook Islands, Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Federated States of Micronesia, Guam, Cook Islands, Samoa, Tonga, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, New Caledonia, French Polynesia, Australia and New Zealand had confirmed their participation. However, 34 representatives, including 15 females, participated in the webinar.

• 5th

6th August 2020: “Innovations and Challenges for IST in Parliaments during the Pandemic”. In partnership with the New Zealand Parliament’s Tai A Kiwa Stronger Pacific Parliaments Programme, Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) Centre for Innovation in Parliament and UNDP, the webinar explored how Parliaments in the Pacific region developed an informational technology based response to COVID-19. The webinars discussed more broadly planning, resilience, business continuity, and contingency management in a regional context. Around 30 participants, including 8 females, from the Pacific parliaments participated in the webinar.

• 30th September 2020: “Emergency Powers and the Role of Parliament”. The Webinar shared the core concepts and standards related to a state of emergency, along with sources of these standards, shared and discussed the role that parliament should play based on the standards and the application of these standards within the Pacific context and the associated challenges. Around 28 participants, including 8 females, joined the session from across 15 Pacific Parliaments.

For comparison, the webinars drew on experiences made by other Parliaments in the region and SIDS, including the Parliaments of New Zealand, the Maldives New South Wales and Australia. Congress of FSM, Fiji Parliament, and Samoa Legislative Assembly presented their efforts to adapt and respond to the Pandemic. Also, UNDP's consultants and team presented on global good practices and standards related to the above topics

Speaking at the launching event, the Vice-Speaker of Congress of the Federated States of Micronesia TH Esmond B. Moses, one of the panellists, commented after the webinar that, "despite lack of resources, Pacific Parliaments have accepted the challenge bravely and responded tremendously…the FSM Congress has organised two consecutive virtual sessions, which resulted in the approval of US$2 million response packages, the introduction of 21 resolutions and approval of 32 bills". He further commended the project's efforts in supporting the Pacific Parliaments, including the FSM Congress, to strengthen legislatures and thereby improve the quality of democratic governance in the region. He said that "the new UNDP webinar series will continue the promotion of Parliamentary excellence in the region while also strengthening social and political cohesions during the pandemic"

UNDP has received very positive feedback on the webinars with 98% of respondents, including male and female staff, rating the sessions as an excellent platform for shared experiences and learning.

Budget Documentation Workshop

To enhance the capacity of key stakeholders, the project supported a regional virtual workshop building on the discussions and conclusions of the September 2019 Budget Documentation workshop. To ensure participants were available for the entire duration, the workshop sessions were spread over several one day sessions between 22nd September and 9th October 2020.

Participants to these workshops were invited from two different functional areas within government. Firstly, senior budget officials who are involved in budget formulation and implementation. Secondly, members of legislative secretariats who provide budget analysis to members of parliament (MP’s) from all PFTAC member countries7 . Participants from the second group composed of individuals who have been involved in the UNDP’s floating budget office as well as selected parliamentary staff and elected representatives. Members of the civil society engaging on the EU-funded Public Finance Management (PFM) project were also given the opportunity to participate in selected sessions. Such a diverse participation helped undertake discussion on common challenges and finding ways for mutually addressing them.

Participants shared good budget preparation and documentation practices within ministries of finance, enhancing participants understanding and awareness of contemporary expectations of what information should be contained within documents provided to the Legislature (and which are published) supporting the proposed budget. Additionally, the discussions focused on greater fiscal transparency across the region, a critical area of focus given the COVID-19 context where significant increases in public expenditure have occurred in response to the health issue and for economic recovery.

Senior budget officials from government agencies across the Pacific and SLIP project parliamentary staff who have been involved in the UNDP’s floating budget office and provide budget analysis to members of parliament (MPs) benefited from the workshop.

They included representatives of the Parliaments of Samoa, Solomon Islands and the Congress of the Federated States of Micronesia. The workshop was delivered virtually whereas participants joined University of South Pacific campuses throughout the Pacific.

Youth Parliament Engagement Initiative on International Day of Tolerance

UNDP has helped a number of Pacific parliaments to organise national youth parliament through SLIP and other regional programmes. These programmes have remained very successful and popular both among youth and the parliaments, giving them an important platform to immerse into learning about the importance of parliamentary work while developing future leadership in the country. Most of these parliaments and youth participants have always expressed the need to continue the engagement beyond one-of national youth parliament events. To capitalise on this opportunity, UNDP designed and tested a pilot initiative on youth parliament engagement. The initiative had dual objectives of engaging youth parliament alumni, on one hand, and helping parliament carry out its outreach activities on the other hand. Two regional parliaments, National Parliament of the Solomon Islands and the Legislative Assembly of Tonga, participated in the initiative and brought back 12 and 15 youth parliament alumni members, respectively, back for the initiative.

The initiative was implemented in three phases. In the first phase, a two-day orientation was arranged for the alumni from two countries. This was hybrid event and included virtual and incountry sessions. For the virtual session, UNDP collaborated with UN Office of High Commissioner for Human Rights, and oriented participants about the concept and importance of international day of tolerance using the international human rights treaties. The virtual session also involved discussion on the value to youth’s engagement into parliament with visions of inspiring youth to also take part in the politics of the country. The second set of sessions was nationally led by the two parliaments and looked internally to relate the concept of tolerance within the national context and also plan for the outreach activities in the next phase.

Under the next phase, the youth delegates along with parliament staff carried out outreach activities in the national capital and outer Islands of the two countries. Here, they reached to different community groups such as youth, women, school children and elderly to first orient them on importance of tolerance and then discuss with them their issues relevant to tolerance. The two countries held 30 community meetings and reached out to around 10000 people in both countries.

Following the outreach events, the youth delegates came back to the national capitals to for the third and last phase. Here they set together in their respective country teams to consolidate the findings from their outreach activities. After consolidating the national findings, youth from two countries held virtual session to share their experience and findings. After this, they also presented their findings to the MPs in both countries with recommendations for using the parliamentary forums to help address the issues brought forward by the communities.

The initiative remained very popular among the youth participants, who not only appreciated the opportunity to bring them back to the parliaments, but to also learn about the new concept of tolerance and to interact with communities on behalf of the parliament.

A female youth member from the Solomon Islands shared that “it was first time for her to learn about tolerance. I was particularly surprised to learn that tolerance is not just social virtue but a moral and legal obligation on all of us”. All youth delegates recommended to continue this initiative and explore further topics in future.

Development of Briefing Papers and other knowledge products on COVID-19

To facilitate the discussions on the webinars and provide technical support on different aspects related to parliamentary response to COVID-19, the SLIP Project developed a briefing paper collating various models that have emerged globally from parliamentary adaption and response to COVID-19. The document captures practices on adjustments to plenary sessions, committee meetings, voting arrangements and business continuity plans. Coupled with the paper, the SLIP project has also compiled a database on some of the key resources that the parliaments can use to dig further information. The paper and database are being circulated to parliaments on the need basis while the information from them are regularly used in the SLIP project team's meetings with partner parliaments.

Conclusion

Despite the immense challenges that the pandemic presented to the Pacific Parliaments and UNDP team, the SLIP project made many headways during the year. It provided essential business continuity support to the Pacific parliaments through its timely and relevant hardware and software solutions. These ensured that two parliaments, Samoa and FSM, to operate virtually and responded to the pandemic needs such as passing the stimulus packages and helped the parliaments of Vanuatu and the Solomon Islands stand ready to operate virtually if the situation so demands. The project’s technical support also helped parliaments to get ready and respond better to the pandemic. The webinar series provided much needed capacity building support. While responding to the pandemic related needs, the project did not loose focus on consolidating results from it’s on-going support. It this regard, project helped materialise the approval of Vanuatu’s revised standing orders, which empowered committees and simplified many other procedures. Likewise, the FSM Congress approved its sexual harassment policy providing for a more safer environment for staff and MPs. Engagement with

RMI remained challenged but the project has done it’s best to engage with Nitijela. The project’s support nonetheless appreciated by all benefitting parliaments, which also demonstrated by the letter of extensions that four parliaments sent to UNDP and the Government of Japan.

Annex 1: Financial Summary for the period: 01 January – 31 December 2020i

Intendedoutputs Results

Output1

Committees have enhanced capabilities to undertake their legislative and oversight functions, including skills to ensure that the SDGs and development issues are mainstreamed across Parliament’s work, including gender mainstreaming

Result 1.1: Chairs and members ofParliamentcommitteesprovided supporttoenable them to conduct their responsibilities effectively through the provision of trainings, briefs, technical assistanceandresearch

Result1.2: Assistanceprovidedtocommitteestaffand committee services through hands-on trainings, south -south attachments, technical expertise, guidance and trainings to capacitate their work to betterprovide assistancetotheirspecificcommittees

Result 1.3: Support provided to the work of committees through workshops, seminars, trainings, expertadviceandguidance,proceduraladviserelating tocommitteefunctions,

61,360.67

58,676.71

260,923.87

Output2

MPs, including women MPs, and staff have increased capacities and improved professionalism to fulfil their obligations, benefitting from exposure to otherParliaments through south-south triangular cooperation

Output3

Parliamentaryfinancial oversight is improved with system becoming moreparticipatoryandtransparent

Output4

Increased number of potential womencandidatesareawareofthe work ofParliamentand increased numberofcitizensrecognisewomen aspotentialParliamentarians

Result 2.1: Skills development provided to MPs through workshops onParliamentprocedures, briefs, attachmentsandtechnicaladviceandsupport

Result 2.2: Assistance provided to staff of theParliamentSecretariat as engine rooms ofParliaments,tobeabletofulfiltheirRoleassupport and backbone to the functions ofParliamentthrough trainingsetc.

Result3.1: forthePublicAccountCommittees(PACs)/ FinanceCommitteestoimprovetheirscrutinywork

Result 3.2: Seminar for MPs to improve budget processesandoversight

Activity 4.0: Potential women candidates trained on theworkofMPsandParliaments

62,548.96

11,840.63

55,515.27

15,719.31

Activity 5: Effective technical advisory services and projectimplementationincludingdirectprojectcosts 3,067.01