AGORA Parliamentary Development Community of Practice held “Mapping and connecting parliamentary research services around the world” online workshop, taking place on 20 September 2023, 13:00 – 16:00 CEST. 

The workshop was co-organised by AGORA Parliamentary Development Community of Practice, INTER PARES | Parliaments in Partnership – EU Global Project to Strengthen the Capacity of Parliaments and UK’s Parliamentary Office of Science & Technology. It was designed to provide an opportunity to share and learn more about the work of parliamentary research services and their role in building strong parliaments around the world. 

• Dr Jonathan Murphy, Head of Programme at INTER PARES, and Lydia Harriss, Senior Adviser and Physical Sciences Lead at the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology, House of Commons, UK welcomed participants of the workshop.
• Parliamentary Academic Fellows with the UK’s Parliamentary Office of Science & Technology Dr Vicky Ward and Dr Mark Monaghan shared work they had done to map the services helping parliaments across the world to access and harness research evidence. 
• Dr Ida Kelemen, coordinator of the Parliamentary Libraries, Research and Archives at ECPRD, and Head of Parliamentary Research Service at Hungarian National Assembly, presented the European landscape of parliamentary research services.
• The workshop provided an opportunity to share and learn more about the work of parliamentary research services and their role in building strong parliaments around the world from colleagues representing parliaments of:
  • Austria: Dr Christoph Konrath, Head of the Department of Scientific Support and Coordination in Parliamentary Matters, Austrian Parliament; Dr Christoph Clar, Expert, Parliamentary Administration, Austrian Parliament.
  • Canada: Dr Heather Lank, Parliamentary Librarian of Canada; Dr Lalita Acharya, Senior Director, Economics, Resources and Environment Division, Library of Parliament.
  • Czech Republic: Dr Štěpán Pecháček, Director of the Parliamentary Institute, Chamber of Deputies, Parliament of the Czech Republic.
  • Ghana: Dr Abraham Ibn Zackaria, Deputy Director of Research in the Parliament of Ghana.
  • Pakistan: Dr Muhammad Rashid Mafzool Zaka, Director General (Research) and Founder Member, Pakistan Institute for Parliamentary Services.

FInd out more information (including materials) from the workshop here.