The Council of Chairmen of Standing Committees of the National Assembly Secretariat Thursday met under the chairmanship of National Assembly Speaker Ayaz Sadiq and took up important issues pertaining to empowerment and strengthening of Parliament the Standing Committees.
Upon observations by the chairpersons of the committees regarding non implementation of their recommendations by the government, Sadiq advised them to follow the law and hold the ministries accountable.
Those members who are habitually absent from the meetings should be served two consecutive notices and their membership should be cancelled. He further said there are provisions for this procedure in the Rules of National Assembly. According to Rule 201 government is bound to respond to the standing committees.
The chairpersons pointed out the lack of research facilities to which Sadiq assured them of better facilities since National Secretariat is recruiting new ROs through Federal Public Service Commission.
Sadiq also assured the chairpersons that National Assembly Secretariat will help committees in setting up their websites. In order to increase the efficiency of the officers of the Secretariat, they would be trained in the fields of legal drafting and research work.
Another obstacle observed by the chairpersons was unwillingness by the ministries to provide information to which Sadiq informed them that this matter should be brought in to notice of the concerned ministers and federal secretaries and the officers can be proceeded against.
In his concluding remarks, the speaker assured the meeting of his full cooperation in improving the efficiency and output of the Standing Committees.
More than 30 chairpersons attended the meeting including Leader of Opposition in National Assembly Syed Khurshid Shah.
