Involving Parliaments in Poverty Reduction

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Involving Parliaments in Poverty Reduction
CIS Roundtable on Parliaments, Governance and
Poverty Reduction Istanbul, Turkey 23-24 March
2004 Katrina Sharkey (PRMPR)
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Focus of Presentation

• Parliamentary Involvement
• Context Institutionalizing participation in
  PRSPs
• Why Involve Parliaments a summary
• Some Entry Points for Parliaments
• Design Phase
• Implementation Phase
• Comparative Involvement of Parliaments
• Lessons learned
• Bank and non-Bank work with parliaments
• Conclusion

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Context

• 2000 2003 period highlights relevance of
  broad-based participation
• Consultation vs. Participation
• Stakeholder Involvement
• Intra-governmental
• Societal

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Institutionalising the PRSP within government
POLICY FORMULATION

INTEGRATION
EVALUATION
COORDINATION
MONITORING
DECENTRALIZATION
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Institutionalising the PRSP outside
governmentThe participatory process
Government
Parliament
Consultation/ working groups
Intermediary organizations
Citizens
Alison Scott DfID, UK, 2002
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Core Functions of Parliaments

• Legislative Function
• Passing laws
• Participation in policy making
• Oversight Function
• Holding Governments to account
• Representative Function
• Representing constituents, giving voice

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Why Involve Parliaments in the PRSP? Reasons
relate to 3 functions of parliament
legislative, representative, oversight

• ENDS
• To enhance country ownership
• To enhance Government Accountability

• MEANS
• To increase and institutionalize participation
• To strengthen ME systems via local and existing
  institutions

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Limited Involvement to date

• Mainly government MPs and not parliament
• 2002 Progress Report
• Parliaments overlooked in design process
• 2003 Progress Report
• indicates increasing involvement
• Implementation gaps emerging
• Donor partners and NGOs concerned about impact on
  governance

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The PRSP Policy Process locating entry points
for Parliament
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Examples of how Parliaments can be included

• Consult MPs early in the process (Niger, Albania)
• Link involvement to the budget process (e.g. BiH
  Tanzania)
• Facilitate information flows to Parliaments where
  Executive does not (e.g. Ghana)

• Use committees and sub-committees (e.g. Albania,
  Serbia)
• Engage MPs and committees in policy dialogues
  with the WB (e.g. Mozambique, Nigeria)

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Parliamentary Involvement in PRSP Policy Cycle

• PRSP Working Groups
• MPs are members of WGs
• Examples Montenegro, BiH
• Presented to Parliament
• More Draft or Full PRSPs being presented to
  Parliament.
• Examples Niger, Tajikistan and Ethiopia, Vietnam
  
• Policy Prioritization
• Limited given Parliaments constitutional role
  vis-à-vis the Executive.
• Examples Kyrgyz Republic, Nicaragua

• Review by Committee
• Some PRSPs being given more detailed review.
• Examples Mozambique, Malawi, Ghana, Ethiopia,
• Monitoring and Evaluation of PRSP by Parliament
• Limited involvement to date
• Emerging area of concern
• Georgia case of good practice

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Sharkey and Dreger, Parliamentary Involvement in
the PRSP World Bank (2003)
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Global Snapshot of Parliamentary Involvement

• Albania
• Ad hoc committee on PRSP to be established to
  increase parliamentary involvement
• Georgia
• Parliament to evaluate status / development /
  achievement of PRSP objective will receive
  quarterly reports to allow impact
• Burkina Faso
• PRSP presented to both houses of Parliament for
  ratification prior to submission to Bank and Fund
  
• Tajikistan
• Participation of MPs in PRSP preparation working
  groups
• Parliamentary approval of PRSP

• Uganda
• Presentation and discussion of the PRSP in
  Parliament shortly prior to submission
• Mauritania
• Reps from Upper House were members of the working
  committee monitoring PRSP process
• Debates of poverty in parliament
• Parliamentary approval of PRSP
• Azerbaijan
• MP participation in some 15
• PRSP working groups PRSP committee
• FR Yugoslavia
• Creation of Standing Committee on PRSP
• Strengthened links with Finance and Budget
  Committee
• Nicaragua
• Forestry policy consultations between Ministry of
  Agriculture / Forestry NA commission on
  Environment / Natural resources

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Building Capacity to support Parliamentary
Involvement

• World Bank and IMF and donors realize need for
  parliamentary involvement to sustain mechanisms
  for participation and oversight
• PRSP Trust Fund supports capacity development of
  Executive, Parliament, Civil Society
• Weak parliamentary capacity (Members, staff)
  often inhibits parliaments involvement
• WBI and PREM supporting efforts to raise
  awareness within and outside Bank

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Lessons Learned First Generation

• Knowledge and Awareness
• MPs in many countries still learning about PRSP
• Parliaments missed opportunities in design phase
• Participation Gap but some parliaments flexing
  Constitutional muscle (Ghana, Nigeria, BiH,
  Albania)

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Lessons Learned Second Generation

• Issue identification Action-oriented
• The budget cycle, linked to the PRSP, provides
  best opportunities for sustained input of
  Parliament
• Challenge is in sustained follow-up, including
  with staff
• Capacity building / skills training
• Macro and Finance issues
• Sectoral issues

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Bank and Non-Bank Approaches to support
parliamentary involvement

• Through Lending
• e.g PRSCs and IDF Grants
• Through WBI-PREM
• Awareness raising and action-oriented capacity
  enhancement activities
• External Partners
• PNoWB taps WB/IMF donor expertise

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Conclusions

• If PRSP is to have meaningful country ownership,
  participation is to be institutionalized, receive
  genuine political support Parliament needs to be
  involved
• Given parliaments constitutional mandate, PRSP
  process creates obvious entry points for its
  meaningful involvement in design and oversight of
  poverty reduction
• Parliament itself should determine level of
  involvement, not donors