I Cannot Imagine a Strong Parliament Without a Powerful Administration

The Parliament’s administration holds a special place in establishing and strengthening the Parliamentary oversight function. More specifically, it has to play active role in every step involved, on the road to strengthening the oversight function,the Secretary General Givi Mikanadze explained.

“The Parliamentary Office is a very important unit in this process, because the factors contributing to the activities of the parliament also contribute to the functioning of the entire staff. Consequently, the high performance of the Parliament’s oversight function largely depends on the quality, skills and competence of the people employed in the implementation of the oversight functions by the Parliament.

The staff of the parliament’s administration are meant to prepare the documentation, research and other necessary documents for the implementation of this function at highly professional levels. It is one of the priorities for the strengthening of the institution, to ensure that the norms defined by the Constitution and legislation are realized in practice, for us to maximize the full implementation of the powers granted to the Parliament.”We spoke to Mikanadze, who shared appreciable insights into the parliament’s administration and readiness for the new Rules of Procedure.

What role will you play in strengthening the Parliamentary oversight function?

We need to be fully ready to meet this process. We have made plans, and are looking to implement the following measures:

Educational direction – the Parliament has its training center, where we educate staff and strengthen them accordingly as one of our priorities.

We started cooperating with educational institutions operating in state structures. From May till now, we have signed a Memorandum of Cooperation (MoC) with 16 of such educational institutions, with an operative framework where representatives of these institutions, visit the Parliament and train our staff for free. As a result, our staff are getting more information about related to field expertise and law enforcement.

In addition, we have a group of internal trainers, who are supported by the National Institute for Democracy and the United Kingdom.

We have next year’s plan in place – we are going to implement an e-learning platform, which means we would be preparing electronic training materials, and execution of the programs for the employees of Administration and the MPs of bureaus (who are located in 95 units of 73 districts), to the current staff members who have access to electronic learning, from whom we will obtain information on a variety of issues and to fully implement their authority.

The most important component is the reorganization of the research department and its conversion into a Legal Entity of Public Law and the “Research Center of the Parliament of Georgia”. Today, the Research Department is functioning amongst Parliamentary Staff, and it performs a very important and valuable role. First of all, the Committees and, in some cases, the MPs and the Parliamentary Leadership, helps in finding and analyzing foreign practices on various issues.

The most important component is the research department reorganization. The Research Department functioning at the Parliamentary Office today carries a very important and valuable case. First of all, they help the Committees and in some cases, the MPs and parliamentary leadership to seek and analyze foreign practice on various issues.

In addition to this, special attention will be paid to the establishment of regulatory impact assessment, which is already implemented in the practice of leading countries. It is important to have a Research Center for the Parliament, with selective and prioritized attitude to conducting preliminary research, through a number of draft laws to assess the impact of regulation. The research department is currently not equipped with this function. One of the cornerstones of the reorganization is to increase the functionality of the research department and to establish impact assessment function as one of its components.

We believe that some already accepted laws, after a certain period, can help us evaluate the influence of regulation, which gives us an idea of what positive and negative changes it had on the society. This will give Parliament a chance to detect and eliminate existing shortcomings. Thus as I said, this will come into place with the reorganization of the research department and its transformation into a legal entity of public law. Within the new status, this agency will have its own budget and opportunity to get active cooperation from donors, funding and promotion, which will eventually reflect on the activities of this agency and the Parliament as a whole.

The development of the Department of Research, which is supported by the UNDP and the European Union, is a priority and is an important cornerstone of the reforms, which are being carried out amongst Parliamentary Staff. At the same time, its increased authority will directly promote the strengthening of the Parliament as a supervisory functioning body. In the framework of the research center, it will be possible to increase the base of experts, which will enable us to use expert knowledge of the relevant sphere according to all fields.

The Research Department is a member of ECPRD, which is a network of research departments operating in parliaments of European countries. It was created by the EU Parliament and the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE). We are actively involved in this network. Within the framework of the proposed draft law, this network can provide with information about the legislative regulation practice in several parliaments across Europe, within 2 weeks. Based on their analysis, we have the opportunity to prepare concrete and thorough conclusions and use it as a function of the influence of regulatory assessment, as well as in the preparation of the conclusion on the initiated draft law.

In addition to this, we have the initiative of the staff that has been supported by the parliament’s leadership, to create a small print house in the Parliament. In this regard, the German Technical Development Agency has provided significant support for the purchase of a special computer laboratory. At moment, negotiations are ongoing with the donors directly, to purchase the printing press machinery. From the budget of the Parliament, the sum was allocated for space preparations in readiness for the print house. We hope that at the end of the year, we will have successful results in relationships with donors and from 2019, this printing will start functioning. It will enable us publish annual reports of committees and the Parliament, prepared by the Research Department, which are important in the direction of supervisory function, as they would enable us to provide material and service to interested individuals and agencies, as well as to the general public. Besides, we can make different accounts in the form of magazine and distribute to executive powers.

What type of communication do you have with regions?

Starting from October, we are going to actively cooperate with the Bureau Heads and Representatives. We will meet the heads of the Parliament Administration Bureau in Western Georgia between October 9-10 and in Eastern Georgia on October 11-12. In the format of these meetings, we will discuss all the problems related to their activities. As you know, bureaus are working directly with the citizens in these regions. Many citizens apply to them to file a complaint and to request for assistance. We believe that working with them will allow us analyzed information from majority of the MPs, which will be followed by appropriate reaction, including contact with the heads of the particular agency.

Strengthening of bureaus and cooperation with them is one of the priority directions for the Parliament of Georgia and we are starting its development now.

All of the above mentioned activities - strengthening the learning process, starting work with bureaus, reorganizing the research department, establishing a new structure and creating a publishing house - are the steps that have already been implemented, the part is still in the process; However, in the nearest future, the final result will be adopted and this will, in turn, contribute to strengthening the parliament and strengthening the control of the parliament’s supervisory function. What successful results have you recorded? We have really impressive results in educational terms. Since June, up to 8 trainings have been conducted by partner educational institutions, thus significantly increasing the knowledge and qualification of staff personnel on various issues.

In retrospect, our relationship still continues with the donor and partner organizations. During this period, up to 10 trainings have been conducted by the National Democratic Institute (NDI), the German Technical Development Agency (GTDA), the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), the “Good Governance Initiative” funded by the Government of the United States, and the NATO Professional Development Center (NPDC), who all emphasizes active and results oriented cooperation in this direction.

A 5-week internship study program was designed and has been worked on for several months. We also introduced a new internship program, where we have extended the period from 3 to 6 months. The first 5 weeks will be dedicated to this training program and its exam will begin on October 1. Within this basic program, there are many practical elements (attendance at committee hearings, attendance on bureau session and analysis), which will strengthen the interns. Also, this program will be used for the training of all new employees. As for the research, has this work already started? In April, during my official visit to Bundestag, we talked with the head of the staff and we gained assurance that Bundestag will actively promote the development of the research department. At the end of September, the Deputy Head of the Bundestag Office, who is the head of research direction in Germany, will visit Georgia. He will deliver two-day training to the staff of our research department, to share their experiences and methodology that has been established in the Bundestag.

In the end, how important is the strengthening of the staff to the oversight function of the parliament?

I want to tell you that you cannot imagine a strong parliament without a powerful administration. Here is the circuit principle - the strongest office is the foundation of a strong parliament; and for a strong parliament and control, the supervisory function is a guarantee that the execution of the legislation adopted by the executive powers will be possible. All this, in the end, is related to the well-being of each citizen.