Public Consultation On Govt Transparency Launched

A public consultation on government transparency and accountability has been announced by Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Paschal Donohoe.

The consultation is part of the process to develop Ireland's second National Action Plan under the Open Government Partnership (OGP) initiative, which challenges governments to be more transparent, accountable and responsive to citizens.

Initiating the process, Minister Donohoe said: "I am leading the Government's efforts to create, with citizens, a second National Action Plan as part of the Open Government Partnership. As part of this international initiative, the Government will agree commitments to make the State more transparent, more accountable and more inclusive in how it reaches decisions, delivers services and communicates with its citizens."

Ireland's first National Action Plan, 2014-2016, promoted citizen participation in policy making, strengthened governance and accountability and advanced the Government's Open Data strategy.  Its major achievements included legislation to regulate lobbying, protect whistleblowers and reform of the Freedom of Information and ethics regimes.

Issuing an initial consultation document Open Government Partnership Ireland: Have Your Say, Minister Donohoe said: "I look forward to working with citizens, civil society interests, businesses and public service users on the development of Ireland's second National Action Plan. Together we can make it challenging and effective, further improve Government transparency and help bring the citizen closer to political and public life.

"The second National Action Plan will not only help improve policy making and the delivery of services, it will also aim to further strengthen our systems of governance and accountability and prevent corruption. The actions in the Plan, which will run to the end of June 2018, may involve new technologies, or improve the ways we use existing ones.

"In line with the Programme for a Partnership Government, the second National Action Plan will help change the relationship between the Irish people, their parliament and their Government. I expect the Plan will have an impact on making budgets and spending more transparent, will improve accountability arrangements, will make public consultations more effective and ensure information on performance and delivery is shared more openly by public bodies.

"Furthermore, creating a new National Action Plan provides an opportunity to further promote Open Data policies by public bodies. This has the potential to yield economic and employment benefits, in addition to strengthening the performance accountability of public bodies."

(MH)