Parliamentary Standing Orders to be reviewed

Accra, Feb. 19, GNA- The Speaker of Parliament, Mr. Peter Ala Adjetey, Thursday announced that the Standing Orders Committee of Parliament would meet over the weekend at Elmina to review the Standing Orders of the House.

This announcement comes at a time when the Speaker and the Leadership of the House had been under considerable pressure from members to review portions of the Standing Orders to make it less rigid. A case in point was how absenteeism is captured in the "Votes and Proceedings" paper, with some calling for a distinction to be created between members absent on their personal business and those absent on Parliamentary Business.

The core of the suggestions on that issue, championed by Interior Minister, Mr Hackman Owusu-Agyeman, was to the effect that those absent on Parliamentary Business, should be marked "On Parliament Business" rather than simply "absent" or "absent with permission". The Speaker had insisted that until the Standing Orders were amended, any member not physically present in the House would be marked absent or at best absent with permission.

He urged members of the committee who think they could not be present at the review meeting to inform the Clerk in time to ensure that their names were excluded in the reservations list to be sent to the Elmina Motel.