Parliament 2009 Sitting Calendar
January 26th, 2009 at 10:00 am by David FarrarThe recommended House sitting programme for 2009 has been out for a while. So how does it look:
- Two weeks from 10 February
One week recess - Two weeks from 3 March
One week recess - Three weeks from 24 March
Two weeks recess - Three weeks from 28 April
One week recess - Two weeks from 26 May
One week recess - Three weeks from 16 June
Two weeks recess - Three weeks from 21 July
One week recess - Two weeks from 18 August
One week recess - Three weeks from 8 September
Two weeks recess - Three weeks from 13 October
Two weeks recess - Two weeks from 17 November
One week recess - Three weeks from 8 December
Rise around 22 December
A total of 31 weeks spread over 12 sessions. This seems about normal off memory.
Contrary to what some may think, it is not holiday time for MPs in recess weeks. You still have constituency work, some select committees, caucus committees, policy development, stakeholder meetings, party activities, correspondence etc – plus of course Ministers are still governing.
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January 26th, 2009 at 11:41 am
Great to hear what people know about their MP’s.
Vote:Quite a number of community members think their MP’s are sitting in their electoral officxes waiting to sort out problems like dogs,school bus runs,waiting lists for hospitals and other quite minor matters.
I have even heard complaints from people they cannot immediately see their own MP personally, even though that MP is a high level government minister.
Somehow the people of NZ need to understand how parliament operates, Parliament is like an iceberg – one tenth visible like the debating chamber and nine tenths of less visible but highly important work.
That’s why some people like Winston Peters got high visibility for show ponying around the irrelevant matters,
January 26th, 2009 at 1:26 pm
It is a far heavier ‘workload’ than that prevailing up to the 1960′s and 1970′s. In those more laid back times, Parliament basically sat when cows were off the milk so dairy farmer MP’s could spare the time to come to Wellington.
Longer sitting times means a vastly increased output in legislation. I wonder whether it is necessary and why it needs to keep changing.In times past, a piece of legislation could survive for decades with only minor changes. Nowadays legislation seems to be overhauled every 10 years if not more frequently.
Vote: