• Agenda and Annotated Agenda (PDF)

The World e-Parliament Conference 2012 was held at the Chamber of Deputies of Italy, in Rome, on 13, 14 and 15 September. The Conference concluded on the International Day of Democracy, established in 2008 by the UN General Assembly.

The school provided knowledge of the most significant ICT standards emerging for legislation, judiciary, parliamentary and administrative documents. The course provided an understanding of their impact in the different phases of the legislative and administrative process, awareness of the tools based on legal XML standards and their constellations, and the ability to participate in the preparation and use of standard-compliant documents throughout law-making process.
This year the course took place in Ravenna, Italy, on 10-15 September 2012.
It was followed on 17-18 September by a Akoma Ntoso Developers Workshop.

The Reports, prepared by the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament, intend to help legislatures to harness the potential benefits of ICT for their work and establish key goals and priorities for exploiting this valuable resource. While providing evidence of the complexities of e-parliament, the Reports suggest ways to overcome some of the obstacles to the effective use of technology in parliamentary settings.

In the framework of the project “Support to ICT Strategic Planning in the SADC Parliaments”, a mission team composed by the Global Centre for ICT in Parliament, SADC Parliamentary Forum and the Assembly of the Republic of Portugal undertook the second assessment mission to the National Assembly of Mauritius from 25 to 31 May 2011.

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the Parliament of Algeria are cooperating to support the Parliament, in the framework of UNDP's Global Program for Parliamentary Strengthening. In this context, a call for proposals for the procurement of an integrated transcription system for parliamentary proceedings has been issued. Deadline: 5 May 2011.

Globalization increases the need of fast and accurate written communications: fast writing methods play an important role in supporting ICT technology to reach this goal thus helping in eliminating communication barrier even in one-to-one meetings also from distant places and in different languages.

Parliamentary documents such as committee reports and texts of debates and hearings are fundamental records of the legislature. These documents must be prepared quickly, efficiently and accurately. They must be distributed easily and then amended, revised and redistributed just as easily. And they must be archived effectively to ensure availability and long-term preservation. The findings of the 2010 edition of the World e-Parliament Report indicate that timely public availability of such legislative records is a key ingredient for a more open, transparent and accountable legislature, and therefore a cornerstone of healthy parliamentary democracies.

The U.K. Parliament has adopted a policy to use open technology standards to increase public participation in political debate. The Parliamentary Information Communication and Technology office (Pict) policy is part of proposed plan to distribute broadcasts of parliamentary debates in a form that people can embed in their own websites, in a similar manner to the way YouTube allows video content to be displayed on blogs and other sites.

There is a general lack of knowledge regarding the range of technologies being used for capturing and reporting parliamentary proceedings; the benefits and drawbacks of each approach; the appropriateness of each technology in a specific context, taking into account differences in income level, language and culture among countries; and the opportunities for bi-lateral or multi-lateral cooperation that exist, regardless of the development level of each parliament.

This report contains the proceedings of the Workshop on Technological Options for Capturing and Reporting Parliamentary Proceedings, which was hosted by the European Parliament in Brussels on 14 -16 July 2010. Parliamentary documents such as committee reports and texts of debates and hearings are fundamental records of the legislature. These documents must be prepared quickly, efficiently and accurately. They must be distributed easily and then amended, revised and redistributed just as easily. And they must be archived effectively to ensure availability and long-term preservation.

Parliamentary documents such as committee reports and texts of debates and hearings are fundamental records of the legislature. These documents must be prepared quickly, efficiently and accurately. They must be distributed easily and then amended, revised and redistributed just as easily. And they must be archived effectively to ensure availability and long-term preservation.

1. Governing at a time of technological changes
2. An overview of the findings of the World e-Parliament Report 2010

Statements and Presentations - World e-Parliament Conference 2009