In order to introduce the section on charity responsibilities I will talk about the charity I did my internship for, and what the internship work consisted of. First I'll explain what an APG is and does, then what the benefits of running one are for MindWise and what my job there consisted of.
What are All-Party Groups?
An All-Party Group is an opportunity for parliamentarians to discuss issues outside of the common room. They can bridge party lines, make alliances, ensure they are better informed of issues for debate and make plans for what action needs to be taken on these issues and network with representatives of organisations working in the field. Topics range widely, from housing development to jazz appreciation. In Westminster there are country groups as well, to discuss international relations between the UK and for instance Brazil or Qatar.
The All-Party Group meets regularly; ambitious groups may decide to meet monthly but bi-monthly or quarterly meetings are also common, as parliamentarians don't have much time. Meetings are often themed to a particular aspect of the group's topic or to a piece of legislation that falls within their field, e.g. the disability rights group may have a meeting about stigma, or one specifically about a new measure against unemployment. During the meetings there will usually be a couple of speakers who are experts on the specific issue, and there will be opportunity for a (panel) discussion.
The All Party Groups are meant as groups for and by parliamentarians. In Northern Ireland, the group has to be chaired by an MLA and only MLAs can be members. However, MLAs hold the right to ask for external support and this is where charities come in. According to the rules for APGs in Stormont:
All-Party Groups can choose to be supported by outside individuals and organisations. At the discretion of each group, outside individuals and organisations may contribute to organising meetings. They may also attend and speak at meetings. They can advise and support All-Party Groups, including through the provision of permanent secretarial support. They can even provide financial support or other material benefits, provided this is properly registered.However, they cannot become members of an All-Party Group and therefore cannot vote at any meeting or on any issue. Nor can they offer any payment, reward or benefit of any kind in the expectation that the Group or any member of the group will advocate or initiate any cause or matter on their behalf. It is acceptable, however, to arrange and pay for visits for members of the group where the purpose of the visit is related to the subject matter of the group. In such circumstances, members would be required to register receipt of such a visit on the Register of Members’ Interests. (p.13)
Advantages of external secretarial support
If a charitable organisation gives administrative support this has benefits for the MLAs as well as for the organisation itself. As stated MLAs have little time and so it may be too much of a burden to run an APG on top of their other duties, but with external secretarial support this is possible. Organisations already have a professional knowledge of the topic and are therefore better able to choose themes and speakers; they have contacts with other organisations in the field and so the meetings will provide better networking opportunities than if they were organised by an MLA (who, after all, have to spread their attention.)
For the organisation in turn it provides a lot of advantages to be the one running the APGs (rather than another organisation in the field). It increases their visibility for decision-makers and other organisations alike, and they do get some influence on promoting their point of view by inviting speakers who agree. For instance, by running the APG on mental health, MindWise's social model of mental illness gets a good podium rather than the more medicalised view that the Royal College of Psychiatrists would have (N.B. there have been speakers from the RCPsych, but MindWise decides on the themes of the meetings and gets to see the outline of the talk before it is given.) That said, in order to maintain credibility as representatives of the whole mental health sector in Northern Ireland, MindWise does need to invite speakers from many different organisations - their allies as well as their competitors.
Running an APG is a considerable amount of work, though. The administrative tasks include:
- booking meeting spaces and catering
- inventorisation of relevant organisations and stakeholders, making address lists, sending invitations, making attendance lists
- coming up with good themes
- identifying and inviting potential speakers, meeting up with them to plan their talk
- gathering typed versions of all talks, presentation outlines and information leaflets, and sending them to all attendants well in advance along with the agenda
- writing minutes during the meeting and sending them to all attendants afterwards
- getting approval for any decisions made from the responsible MLA
Health-related all Party Groups
Interestingly, looking at the list of APGs in Stormont (which is available on the internet, here) 15 of the 35 total groups have something to do with healthcare (I'm including everything from congenital heart disease to learning disability and pro-lifers.) This shows that the groups are a popular method of lobbying in the health sector in Northern Ireland, for whatever reason. John says the biggest employment sector in Northern Ireland is healthcare as well and that might explain it. I tried to count the number of health-related APGs in Westminster but there are a bit too many to count quickly - of the first five letters (A-E) there are 154 groups of which 32 health-related. That is about one-fifth when in Stormont it was almost half of the groups.
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