Annual ten-hour long interrogation of government performance begins this week

The Annual Review Debate begins this week, when Parliament quizzes ministers about past performance. Kieran McAnulty explains...

One of Parliament's big piece debates begins this week. The Annual Review Debate happens every year as the penultimate stage of a long review of prior government spending and performance (for the financial year ended almost a year previously).

It will stretch across 10 hours and give the opposition a chance to question a line -up of government ministers about their portfolios. This questioning is a follow-up to months of hearings in the subject specialist select committees.

One of the people managing it in the House (from the Opposition point of view), is the Shadow Leader of the House, Labour MP Kieran McAnulty. Phil Smith chats with him about the event.

Labour MP and Shadow Leader of the House, Kieran McAnulty in the debating chamber.

Kieran McAnulty - The Standing Orders give some scope to ask questions about current work programs as well, so it's not entirely looking backwards. But that remains a big part of it.

The annual review debate is interesting, because it's time-limited. And there's a process beforehand where the Opposition registers their interest in certain topics with the Government. And the convention is that the Government will try and accommodate that, but is not really required to fully, but on the whole they do. And so we've gone through that process.

Phil Smith - When you say the topics, you mean, which ministers are going to turn up around?

Yeah, that's right. So the Minister of Finance, Minister of Environment, etc, etc. Associate ministers will be in the house as well during that allocated time period. And if there is a question directed to them, or they are the more appropriate person to answer it, then they can do so from their seat. Whereas the minister, the lead minister, is usually sitting at the Table.

This is the Committee stage debate of the Appropriations (which means budget) Confirmation and Validation Bill, which is the one that sort of ties up all the loose ends on the budget, before the budget. In a committee stage, the Minister responsible for a bill always sits at the table, and is available to answer questions. Well, you know, hopefully answer questions. But then this is like one of those except it's a whole range of ministers.

Yeah, I can understand why it has been set up this way. It's so that Parliament has an opportunity to scrutinize the areas that it has expressed an interest in. And then certain time allocations are given to ministers. So that this time limited debate can be efficiently run…

Go to this episode on rnz.co.nz for more details