PARLIAMENT AND DEMOCRACY - Inter-Parliamentary Union

82 I PARLIAMENT AND DEMOCRACY IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY
self-organising they are, rather than government-inspired and financed. A third
relates to the respective weight that is given to different organisations, and a
concern about the undue influence that some powerful and well-financed
organisations may come to exert over the legislative process.
These concerns indicate the importance of parliament legislating to provide
both a facilitative and a transparent framework within which the organisations
of civil society can operate: for example, by encouraging a voluntary and
not-for-profit sector, and requiring a public register of all bodies which seek to
engage in parliamentary lobbying, including full details of membership and
sources of income. It can also ensure that all submissions from civil society
are conducted through regular channels and that the proceedings are made
public. The German Bundestag, for example, has specific rules stipulating that
groups wishing to express or defend their interests before the legislature must
be entered on a register. The Polish Parliament was at the time of writing
processing a bill on lobbying activities, ‘which it defines as any kind of
activity carried out by lawful means aimed at influencing public authorities to
take into consideration arguments and interests of specific social or professional
groups. The bill establishes admissible forms of influencing decisions
made by public authorities and sets out forms of lobbying supervision.’
An enabling approach
The other side of the coin to preventing undue weight being given to
powerful interests, is that of positively enabling submissions from ordinary
members of the public. One way of doing this is through effective advance
publicity of dates of public hearings and committee meetings. Another is the
provision of advice to the public on how to approach the relevant committee,
and how to frame a submission that will have some influence upon it. Among
the handbooks published by the New Zealand Parliament is one on Making a
Submission to a Parliamentary Select Committee. It is designed ‘to help those
writing a submission to produce it in a form that is easily read and understood
by members of the committee. This will enable a submission to be more
effective and for its recommendations or suggestions to have a greater impact
on the committee.’ Its recommended format for making a submission is
shown below.