Major Highlights of Parliamentary Performance

• National Assembly witnessed a decrease in performance in every sector of legislative activity during 3rd year

• National Assembly met for 15% lesser hours in 3rd year compared to the 2nd year

• National Assembly passed 17% fewer bills in the 3rd year; Indian Lok Sabha passed 60% more bills than the National Assembly of Pakistan during this period

• 21% fewer questions asked by MNAs in the 3rd year

• Only 28% of the questions submitted by MNAs were answered by the Executive in the 3rd year

• PAC remains most active committees of the National Assembly with 56% increase in number of meetings held during third year

• Working Days increase in the Senate but Working Hours decrease 15% over the three Parliamentary years

• Prime Minister attended 95% of the sittings of the National Assembly compared to only 5% sittings of the Senate of Pakistan

• Senate passed an average of 13 bills per year in 3 years compared to 20 bills on average passed by the 13th National Assembly; the Indian Lok Sabha passed 38 bills on average while Rajya Sabha passed an average of 44 bills per year in comparison

• Senator Prof. Khurshid Ahmed (KP, JIP) topped the list of vocal senators in the Senate in 3 years with a total speaking time of 60 minutes each year, followed by Senator Mian Raza Rabbani (Sindh, PPPP) and Senator Muhammad Ishaq Dar (Punjab, PML-N) both of whom have a total time of 50 minutes each year

Islamabad, November 17; In a 3 year performance analysis of Parliament from citizens perspective by PILDAT shows that Reforms in the Budget Process and passage of an effective Accountability law remain unfulfilled agenda in Parliament. Transparency and Access to Information about the National Assembly improved with a new website but data about individual members attendance and performance is still not available.

While the current political set-up is criticized the most for allegations of corruption against it, the public representatives in the Parliament of Pakistan have failed to institute an effective accountability mechanism in the country. A bill originally titled �Holders of Public Office (Accountability) Bill, 2009� is before the National Assembly since April 15, 2009. Prime Minister, Syed Yousaf Raza Gillani, in his very first speech in the National Assembly on March 29, 2008, promised to disband the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) and create instead an independent Accountability Commission as envisaged in the Charter of Democracy signed by the PML-N and PPP leaders. More than three years down the line, this unfulfilled promise is one of the greatest failings of the current Parliament which has allowed the Holders of Public Offices (Accountability) Bill 2009 to stay with the National Assembly Standing Committee on Law, Justice and Parliamentary Affairs since its introduction in April 15, 2009.

Lack of initiative on required reforms in the Parliament, especially on one of its most crucial powers of control over the purse strings or the country�s budget remains another major weakness of the Parliament. The budget session is considered by many MPs as a mere formality in which not much role is there for MPs to make any significant contribution. Year after year, MPs demand during the budget debate a greater role for influencing the budget at its preparation stages suggesting that the National Assembly should institute a pre-budget session seeking members� input at the start of the federal budget cycle from December to February. It has also been repeatedly suggested that once the budget is presented, the National Assembly should have an increased duration to review it and the demands for grants for ministries should be referred to the respective standing committees for scrutiny before the budget is passed. This key reform in the Parliamentary budget process, however, remains elusive despite various promises made by the sitting Government. Government should, however, be commended for bringing more details on the Defence Budget before the Parliament than ever before.

Weak oversight of the Parliament on crucial areas such as national security and foreign policy, remains another area of concern.

Analysis of the 3rd year of the National Assembly�s performance shows that in almost every sector of the legislative activity, the National Assembly witnessed a decrease in performance from that of last year. However, overall the 13th National Assembly of Pakistan has performed significantly better compared to the 12th National Assembly (2002-2007) in terms of legislation passed and the Ordinance to Bills ratio.

The actual number of Working days in the National Assembly during the 1st, 2nd and 3rd parliamentary years were 97, 104 and 104 respectively. This signifies an increase of 7% in the 2nd year and no change in the 3rd year. The total number of working hours of the 13th National Assembly were recorded to be 277 in the first year (2008-2009), 355 in the second year (2009-2010) and 300 during the third year which shows a decrease of 15% in the actual hours the National Assembly met in its 3rd year. The National Assembly passed 3, 29 and 24 Government bills in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd parliamentary year respectively which shows an increase of 867% in the 2nd year and a decrease of 17% in the 3rd year. The 13th National Assembly which has so far passed 5 Private members� bills in 3 years (1 bill in the first year; 3 bills in the second year and 1 bill in the third year), has already surpassed the 12th National Assembly of Pakistan in which only 1 Private Member Bill was passed during 5 years.

A comparison of the legislative performance of the National Assembly with the Indian Lok Sabha for the calendar year 2010-2011 reveals that the Lok Sabha passed 60% more bills than the National Assembly of Pakistan during this period.

The number of questions asked by members has been significantly decreasing over the past 3 years in the 13th National Assembly of Pakistan. Members asked 10843 questions in the first year, 10572 questions in the second year and 8321 in the third parliamentary year, registering a year-to-year decrease of 2% in the 2nd year and 21% in the 3rd year. Furthermore, the percentage of Questions answered remained at 28% in the 1st year, 33% in the 2nd year and 28% in the 3rd year. This is an area of serious concern as lack of an effective system of accepting questions and their disposal through an efficient timeline of receiving answers from concerned ministries and departments is resulting in a declining interest in members to raise issues of national concern in the Assembly in the form of questions. The percentage of questions answered remains pathetically low which needs to improve with procedural reforms and better orientation of members.

Major highlights of the performance of the National Assembly during the 3rd year were the passage of the 19th Constitutional Amendment and the Amendment to the Rules of Procedure regarding the removal of the Leader of Opposition. The Public Accounts Committee�s performance is also worth highlighting as the PAC held an average of 34 meetings per year during the past three years and it has cleared a backlog of audit reports for the past 09 years i.e., 1989-90, 1990-91, 1991-1992 1992-93, 1994-95, 1997-98, 45%1-02, 45%5-06 and 45%8-09. It also presented to the House a Compliance Report 2010 on October 18, 2011. During these three years, Special Committee on Railways chaired by Nadeem Afzal Gondal presented a bold and landmark investigative report about the alleged irregularities in the award of lease of a Railway Golf Club land in Lahore during General Musharraf�s time. House and Library Committee also did a good job while investigating alleged irregularities in an Employees Housing Scheme.

The National Assembly has improved its website with regards to presentation of information. More information, for example the verbatim record of House Debates, is also made available on the National Assembly website. This is a step worth commending and the elected leadership of the National Assembly, including the Speaker and the Deputy Speaker, deserve credit for making National Assembly information promptly accessible to public for the first time in the history of the country. Re-opening of the Parliament Cafeteria should also be commended.

Beside Public Accounts Committee, the most active Standing Committees of the National Assembly include Standing Committee on Health, chaired by Dr. Nadeem Ehsan, MNA (NA-247, Karachi-IX, Sindh, MQM) which held 21 meetings, Standing Committee on Finance, Planning, Revenue and Development, chaired by Ms. Fauzia Wahab, MNA (NA 312, Sindh-V, PPPP) which held 19 meetings and Standing Committee on Food and Agriculture, chaired by Mr. Javed Iqbal Warraich (NA-196 R.Y.Khan-V, Punjab, PPPP) which held 18 meeting during the 3rd Parliamentary year.

The analysis of the performance of the Senate of Pakistan reveals that the number of actual working days in the third year showed an increase of 35% over the 3 years (62 in 2008-2009, 70 in 2009-2010 and 84 in 2010-2011) while the number of working hours registered an overall decrease of 15% over the three Parliamentary years. The number of Government bills passed showed an overall increase of 1150% in the three years (2 in 2008-2009, 12 in 2009-2010 and 25 in 2010-2011).

The number of Private Members� Bills received and passed declined gradually in the three years. The number of Private Members� bills received in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd parliamentary year was 15, 5 and 4 respectively and the number of Private Members� bills passed was 6, 4 and zero (0) respectively. This signifies a decrease of 73% in the number of Bills received.

The number of Starred Questions received showed an increase of 4% in the 2nd parliamentary year, i.e. from 1751 to 1815, and 34% in the third year � from 1815 to 2437. However, the percentage of questions answered did not show a steady increase, with 23% of the received questions answered in the 1st year, 42% answered in the 2nd year and 34% in the third year. The number of Un-starred Questions received remained at 75, 46 and 66 in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd parliamentary year. This shows a decline of 39% in the 2nd year an improvement of 43% in the 3rd year.

During the Parliamentary years 2009-2010 and 2010-2011 the Senate Standing Committee on Cabinet Secretariat and Inter-Provincial Coordination, chaired by Senator Shahid Hassan Bugti (Balochistan, JWP) held a total of 39 meetings-highest by any Committee. It was followed by Senate Standing Committee on Health, chaired by Senator Kalsoom Parveen, (Balochistan, BNP-A) with 30 meetings and Senate Standing Committee on Finance, Revenue, Economic Affairs, Statistics, Planning and Development, chaired by Senator Ahmed Ali, (Sindh, MQM) with 29 meetings.

During the three years Senator Prof. Khurshid Ahmed (KP, JIP) topped the list of vocal members in the Senate with a total speaking time of 60 minutes each year. He was followed by Senator Mian Raza Rabbani (Sindh, PPPP) and Senator Muhammad Ishaq Dar (Punjab, PML-N) both of whom have a total time of 50 minutes each year. Among the top ten most vocal Senators in the Senate, two (2) belong to the Jamaat-e-Islami Pakistan, two (2) to Jamiat-ul-Ulema-e-Islam (F) and one (1) each from PPPP, PML-N, PML, ANP, NP and MQM.

The members who presented the highest number of Private Members� Bills includes Senator Kamran Murtaza (Balochistan, JUI-F) who presented 7 bills during the three Parliamentary years followed by Senator Mian Raza Rabbani (Sindh, PPPP) and Senator Wasim Sajjad (Punjab, PML) with 4 bills each. Among the members who presented the highest number of Calling Attention Notices, Senator Prof. Khurshid Ahmed (KP, JIP) tops the list with 153 Calling Attention Notices followed by Senator Prof. Muhammad Ibrahim Khan (KP, JIP) with 71 Calling Attention Notices and Senator Afia Zia (KP, JIP) who presented 64 Notices.

The presence of the Prime Minister in the Senate remained poor. In 2008-2009, the Prime Minister did not attend even a single sitting of the Senate while he attended two sittings during 2009-2010 and six (6) sittings during 2010-2011. This means that the Prime Minister�s attended 0% meetings in the 1st Parliamentary year, 2% meetings in the 2nd year and 5% in the 3rd year in the Senate of Pakistan.

For a complete analysis on the performance of the National Assembly of Pakistan and the Senate of Pakistan, please see PILDAT Citizens� Reports on:

1. Performance of the 13th National Assembly of Pakistan: The 3rd Year: March 17, 2010 - March 16, 2011
2. Performance of the Senate of Pakistan: Three Years: March 12, 2008 � March 11, 2011