Supporting evidence-based policy making
Parliamentarians are faced with requests from the public that cover an expansive number of topics which have tangible and rapid impacts on people’s lives such as climate-related disasters, public services, employment and health. To encourage the use of data for better informed policy making, MPs and parliamentary research teams need to know where to look to find the data and how to access it easily.
This engagement is done by organising high-level meetings with MPs on data needed for the roles of parliament, and technical trainings on data analysis and interpretation targeted at parliamentary civil servants.
These interactions help to support greater understanding and closer working relationships between NSOs and parliaments.
Scaling up efforts to build on success
PARIS21 collaborated with the Vanuatu Bureau of Statistics (VBoS) to strengthen awareness and skills related to data use in parliament roles of oversight, legislation and representation. Through a series of trainings for parliamentary staff and meetings between MPs and the Vanuatu Bureau of Statistics, Vanuatu has improved data use in policy making to ensure policies meet the needs of the most vulnerable.
Bringing together parliamentary staff and officials
In Gambia, Kenya, Mongolia and Maldives, PARIS21 worked together with the NSOs to create an NSO-Parliament workshop, focusing on enhancing data use in parliament, in particular for parliamentary staff. The workshop focused on improving the knowledge and understanding of parliamentary staff on the value and impact of using data to improve policy decision making and outcomes, enhancing the skills of parliamentary staff in data literacy and helping them to build confidence when it comes to using and communicating data in policy making. The workshops opened areas of continued collaboration between NSOs and the parliament secretariats, creating more requests for data from the NSOs and improving understanding of official statistics as the best source of information for policy making.
PARIS21 and the NSOs of Gambia, Kenya and Maldives hosted meetings with parliament members to discuss the need for data in parliament, the production of official statistics across the national statistics system, and how parliament and the NSS can collaborate to improve data use in policy making.