Citizen Participation in the Parliament

I have met many of you over the last year or so while accompanying the Women’s Political Network to visit your offices calling for support to changes in the electoral law to encourage an increase in the numbers of women members of parliament.

MANS was successful in their application for funding to the UN Democracy Fund in 2018 and this meeting is one of a number of events and activities that seek to strengthen citizen participation in parliament.  

I have a personal experience about citizen participation and parliament – that I think illustrates well the issue and some of the tensions when a member of parliament has to reconcile the local interests of their constituents with that of the country overall.  There have been plans in the UK for expansion of Heathrow Airport for many years, people who live around the airport are against the expansion, their lives will be affected by more noise and congestion. When they voted in the last election, they voted in Members of Parliament that would oppose these plans.  However, national government interests were different and the government wanted the expansion for  economic reasons and it was to be put to a vote in Parliament.  Boris Johnson one of these MPs had promised his local constituents he would never vote for the runway.

As a member of the government, he was obliged to vote as his party directed him,– on the day of the vote, as Foreign Secretary, he conveniently found himself abroad on an official visit. As the newspaper headline noted on the day: “Heathrow third runway: Boris Johnson to be allowed to miss Commons vote on controversial expansion”

Even in circumstances where the link between citizens and their constituents is less direct, finding ways to create a tangible connection – through Citizen participation in the processes – is certainly a way to enhance democracy.  Something I know is important for all of us in the room.

Politicians, as elected representatives, also have a duty represent not only the interests of some, but particularly those whose voices and concerns are least heard. A theme this year in our UN work has been the 70 year anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.  Concerning the human rights we are reminded that it is duty of public servants to represent the rights of all people, regardless of their political views, where they come from, their gender, ability or sexual orientation.

Montenegro should be proud of its parliament, interested in the views of those who debate there and keen to see the institution work to question and hold to account the government and its work.

To do this, it is sometimes not enough to have a once in 4 or 5 years opportunity to vote, but modern institutions are also finding ways to be inclusive. In the era of advanced technology, there is a growing demand for people to feed their views to representatives more often and take part in decisions in between electoral cycles.

Finally let me give you an example of a participatory process with citizens on an even larger scale. The – 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, identified 17 development priorities – a global development plan – the Sustainable Development Goals. This collective vision of better future, whose outline you can see here, directs countries' development towards eradication of poverty and hunger, reduction of inequalities, improvement of education, gender equality, addressing climate change and strengthening institutions essential for human rights, peace and justice.

But what is equally important is how this global Agenda was born. For the first time in history, the development agenda was not created exclusively by leaders and politicians, but also by ordinary citizens. During the worldwide consultations organised in the period 2013-2015, more than 10 million people around the world actively participated in designing the new global development agenda. Their voice was equally important as the voice of world leaders in designing this ambitious plan which was adopted at the UN General Assembly in September 2015, as a vision of a better world by 2030.

Montenegro had an active role in this process. More than 12.000 citizens i.e. 2% of its population, participated in national consultations to inform the new development agenda about the world they want to live in.

Goal 16 – promoting peace and justice and strong institutions specifies a target – how we will know the Goal is achieved – target 16.7 to

“Ensure responsive, inclusive, participatory and representative decisions-making at all levels”.

That’s just one example of how the participation of people can be powerful in designing policies, but also shows willingness of people in Montenegro to take part and to matter both for the national and global causes.

Thank you.