These assemblymen and members of Parliament, after winning their seats in the elections, are expected to be constantly on the ground. They are expected help people in their constituencies plagued with a myriad of problems, almost every time when called. They are, for example, expected to check on clogged drains, attend community receptions, help people harassed by loan sharks, and give away charity hampers.

This is all well and good. Never mind that in an ideal democratic government system, it is the municipal or city council, or the district office, that is expected to respond to public infrastructure grievances.

But the way in which our political picture has evolved over the last few decades, most citizens have by and large become clueless about a greater role that elected representatives are also expected to play.

For the legislature is essentially a policymaking body; it is there to approve enactments that drive the governance of the state. It scrutinises budgets, checks on uses and abuses of government facilities and funds. While doing so, it also engages in serving as a feedback loop between the electorate and the executive; giving ideas and clarifications for the betterment of the whole administration, and future direction of state and nation.

However, due to the way in which our legislative bodies at both state and federal levels have existed in practice over the years, there is a lack of understanding of the importance of such policy and monitoring functions.

In particular, there is a dearth of appreciation of the critical role that can be played by civil society organisations and special committees in a legislature.

In February, in an effort to increase transparency and strengthen its assembly process, the Selangor Legislative Assembly invited the National Democratic Institute to hold a workshop for its assembly members. A similar workshop was then held in October, hosted by the Penang Legislative Assembly. The focus of the workshops were essentially on strengthening legislatures through committees.

Committees are critical in a legislative house as they enable it to have greater expertise on various issues. The existence of committees on specific subjects allows their members, who are also elected representatives, to cover them in greater detail, rather than being restricted by time during normal legislative sittings.

What is interesting about this affair is that under ideal international benchmarks, house committees are expected to consist of representatives from various parties – and not just the majority party grouping that dominates a legislative sitting. The committees are also expected to include civil society groups, and not just bureaucrats who are voted in from any side of the political divide.

In effect, the conclusions and decisions made by such committees, that have multi-partisan representation and public participation, would likely be different from decisions made by a plenary or narrow grouping that hails from a single overpowering political faction.

One system that is promulgated by legislative bodies in developed nations is the use of committee hearings, mainly to get useful inputs from civil society organisations and citizens.

Most people may not know that the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association and the World Bank Institute have set up recommended benchmarks for democratic legislatures. Interestingly, these include:

» the assignment of members on each committee shall include both majority and minority party members and reflect the political composition of the legislature;

» committee hearings, and votes of committee, shall be in public, with any exceptions clearly defined and provided for in the rules of procedure; and

» cross-party groups like interest caucuses around issues of common concern should be actively promoted.

The benchmarks even stress that, typically, a public accounts committee would be chaired by a member of the opposition party. Can such a move to have an opposition member head an important legislative committee be imagined in this country?

Then, in the Malaysian context, we are also confronted with the issue of how our committees can have open, unfettered access to information for them to make effective policy decisions. And how freely civil society organisations can be allowed into the committees to provide insights in helping to steer due focus towards citizens’ priorities.

In advanced democracies, committees are the main engines of legislative activity. They are known to contribute to the ultimate aim of a truly vibrant and effective legislature – to have a government system that runs on auto-pilot, as it were. A system that ensures decisions that are made, and actions that are executed by the government, are accountable to the legislature; and not just done on the whims and fancies that serve the interests of certain political parties in power.