Proceedings start an hour and seven minutes late; three lawmakers present at time of adjournment of sitting

ISLAMABAD, December 1, 2016: The Provincial Assembly of Punjab passed four government bills in the absence of Chief Minister, Leader of the Opposition and Deputy Speaker and continued discussion on the issues related to agriculture sector, observes Free and Fair Election Network in its Daily Factsheet on Thursday.

Following are key observations of the House proceedings during sixth sitting of 25^th session:

Members’ Participation

• The Punjab Assembly met for three hours and 40 minutes.
• The sitting started at 1107 hours against the scheduled time of 1000 hours.
• The Speaker presided over the entire sitting.
• The Chief Minister, Opposition Leader and the Deputy Speaker were absent.
• Twenty-three lawmakers (6%) were present at outset and three (less than one percent) at adjournment of the sitting.
• The parliamentary leaders of JI and PPPP attended the sitting.
• Five minority members also attended the sitting.

Output

• Tabled by Minister for Law, the House passed four legislative proposals, including the Punjab Criminal Prosecution Service (Constitution, Functions and Powers) (Amendment) Bill 2016, the Parks and Horticulture Authority (Amendment) Bill 2016, the Punjab Halal Development Agency Bill 2016 and the Punjab Animals Feed Stuff and Compound Feed Bill 2016.
• The House granted extension to the Public Accounts Committee (PAC), as well as Standing Committees on Services and General Administration, Privileges, Finance and Agriculture for presentation of their reports.

Representation and Responsiveness

• As many as 10 out of 34 Starred Questions were responded to by the government during Question Hour. The lawmakers also asked 21 Supplementary Questions.
• The House resumed general discussion on the issues related to agriculture sector. Seven lawmakers participated in the debate for 28 minutes.
• A Call Attention Notice (CAN) on the killing of a journalist in Sahiwal was responded to by the Law Minister while another CAN sponsored by PPP lawmaker was not taken up.
• Moved by a PML-N lawmaker, the House referred a Privilege Motion to the relevant standing committee while the House could not take up another Privilege Motion.
• The House deferred two Adjournment Motions (AM) and as many Zero Hour notices.

Order and Institutionalization

• The lawmakers spoke on 14 Points of Order consuming 17 minutes of the proceedings.
• Three lawmakers (one Independent and two of PTI) pointed out quorum at 1230, 1333 and 1344 hours respectively. On two occasions, the quorum was found complete after the bells were rung for five minutes while on third time only head count was made and quorum was found complete.

Transparency

• ‘Orders of the Day’ was available to the legislators, observers and public.
• Information on Members’ attendance is available on Punjab Assembly’s website.

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The daily factsheet is based on direct observation of the Punjab Assembly proceedings conducted by PATTAN Development Organization – a member organization of FAFEN. Errors and omissions are regretted.