Information about parliamentary activities should be open to the public, – activists of the Civil Network OPORA think. In order to urge responsibility and openness of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine and attraction of citizens to its activities, OPORA has signed the Declaration on Parliamentary Openness.
Declaration on Parliamentary Openness - is a call to national parliaments by civil society parliamentary monitoring organizations (PMOs) for an increased commitment to openness and to citizen engagement in parliamentary work, enhancing responsibility of representative bodies, and, after all, promoting the development of democratic society.
Main statements of the Declaration are:
Advancing a culture of openness: Parliamentary information shall be able to be reused or republished by citizens with any limited restrictions narrowly defined by law. To enable a culture of parliamentary openness, parliament must enact measures to ensure inclusive citizen participation and a free civil society, enable effective parliamentary monitoring, and vigorously protect these rights through its oversight role. Parliament shall also ensure that citizens have legal recourse to enforce their right to access parliamentary information. Parliament has an affirmative duty to promote citizen understanding of parliamentary functioning and share good practices with other parliaments to increase openness and transparency.
Making parliamentary information transparent: Parliament shall adopt policies that ensure proactive publication of parliamentary information. Parliamentary information includes information about parliament’s roles and functions, and information generated throughout the legislative process, including the text of introduced legislation and amendments, votes, the parliamentary agenda and schedule, records of plenary and committee proceedings, historical information, and all other information that forms a part of the parliamentary record, such as reports created for or by parliament. Parliament shall provide information on the management and administration of parliament, parliamentary staff, and comprehensive and detailed parliamentary budget information. Parliament shall provide information about the backgrounds, activities and affairs of members, including sufficient information for citizens to make informed judgments regarding their integrity and probity, and potential conflicts of interest.
Easing access to parliamentary information: Parliament shall ensure that information is broadly accessible to all citizens on a non-discriminatory basis through multiple channels, including first-person observation, print media, radio, and live and on-demand broadcasts and streaming. Physical access to parliament shall be provided to all citizens, subject to space and safety limitations, with clearly defined and publicly available policies for ensuring access by media and observers. Parliamentary information must also be available free of charge, in multiple national and working languages, and through tools, such as plain language summaries, that help ensure that parliamentary information is understandable to a broad range of citizens.
Enabling electronic communication of parliamentary information: Parliamentary information shall be released online in open and structured formats that allow citizens to analyze and reuse this information using the full range of technology tools. Parliamentary information shall be linked to related information and be easily searchable, as well as downloadable in bulk to encourage the development of new technologies for its exploration.
Reference: The Declaration on Parliamentary openness, which draws on a variety of background documents endorsed by the international parliamentary community, was initially discussed at a conference of PMO leaders that was co-hosted by the National Democratic Institute, the Sunlight Foundation, and the Latin American Legislative Transparency Network in Washington, D.C. The final version of the Declaration, which resides at OpeningParliament.org was launched at the World e-Parliament Conference in Rome on the International Day of Democracy, September 15, 2012.