Open Labour's Results

I made several submissions last year to a project called OpenLabourNZ designed by Clare Curran. It aimed to have consultation with the public in a way parties have never done previously and received thousands of pieces of feedback.

The result is the development of an Open Government Charter. This will contain many of the suggestions to come out of the feedback process that took place earlier in the year. The charter will also go up for further consultation to refine what goes into it.

The main points of the charter currently looking to be included are:

• Require Ministers and Government agencies releasing all Cabinet papers and other relevant papers (with some exemptions) onto a dedicated website, in line with the Official Information Act (the Act), once a decision is announced by government.
• Publish the Hansard in a format that can easily be re-used and republished by anybody for any purpose.
• Release appropriate public sector data and information free of charge, in line with the current Declaration on Open and Transparent Government and NZ Data and Information Management Principles.
• Work towards publishing or broadcasting all public Parliamentary proceedings (such as Select Committees) over the Internet and digital television.
• Consider the regular use of formal citizen assemblies to help develop policy in areas where public input and consideration can assist in tackling complex problems.
• Develop a trial of online voting in local government and general elections.
• Consider the degree to which other public services can be made available online through an easy-to-use one stop website.

David Farrar has criticised the charter for not being "fixed" already and going through more negotiation. He argues Labour should simply announce it as their policy and implement it. This is the very problem the charter aims to fix. It is not acceptable for political parties to say okay we have done a bit of consultation this can never be changed again. The very point of the charter is to open the Government up to being more actively consulting and working with the communities it is supposed to represent.

The amount of work put into the policy is incredible and while I am sure there are things that could be added, like opening Parliament up to OIA's, it is very comprehensive.