Despite agreement, Parliament’s Q&A sessions raise more questions
One of the most frustrating aspects of parliamentary proceedings in recent times has been the way the oral questions and answers session has dragged long past its allotted hour. This is because MPs from both sides waste time raising irrelevant points and making speeches when they should not.
This, in turn, has repeatedly affected the day’s main business. The end result is that time has to be cut down from the speaking time of MPs to make up for the time lost in the morning, with some parliamentarians left with a mere two to three minutes to make their speech for no fault of their own.
The government put its foot down on the matter recently, with Chief Government Whip Prasanna Ranatunga informing the Speaker that government ministers would be released for other duties by 10.30 a.m. since the time allocated for oral questions and answers was one hour starting at 9.30 a.m.
At the meeting of the Parliamentary Business
Committee held to decide the House agenda for this week, party leaders decided to strictly observe the one-hour rule for oral questions and answers. Accordingly, it was decided that once the hour allocated for the question and answer session elapsed, any questions that remained unanswered would be moved to the next sitting day.
The new rule came into effect on Tuesday, but problems surfaced immediately. Only five out of nine questions on the agenda that day had been asked by 10.30 a.m. when Speaker Mahinda Yapa Abeywardena, who had announced the new rule at the start of the day’s proceedings, said all remaining questions would be postponed to the next Parliament date.
Some Samagi Jana Balawegaya (SJB) MPs protested, most notably Gampaha District MP Ajith Mannapperuma, whose question on the X-Press Pearl disaster had been among those that were put off for the following day. He protested angrily to the
Speaker, who countered that Mr. Mannapperuma’s party leaders too had agreed to the change.
Opposition Leader Sajith Premadasa asked for a compromise. Since this was the first day the rule came into effect and since most MPs had only heard about it from the Speaker that morning, he asked that Parliament continue with the questions only for that day with the consent of the government. Accordingly, the Speaker allowed all remaining questions to be asked since the government agreed.
Problems arose again, however, on the following day, with only three out of eight questions being asked by the time the allotted time ended. This time, SJB MP Chaminda Wijesiri exchanged angry words with Deputy Speaker Ajith Rajapakshe over the postponement of the remaining questions.
Judging by the proceedings over the past week, it seems time management will take some getting used to.