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- Engage-in-Brief: 3 June 2025
Engage-in-Brief: 3 June 2025
Holly Bennett
June 03, 2025
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TWO TRICKS TO TRY
When you are writing a submission to a select committee, it’s always best to use your own words. Your experiences and perspective are unique, so your submission should be too. A couple of sentences sharing your whakaaro will make more of an impact than three pages written by someone else and shared by a hundred other people.
Did you know that when a Minister gives a speech, their speaking notes are usually published on the Beehive website? Although most of us don’t have time to spend our days following Ministers around listening to everything they have to say, it can be very useful to know what issues they’re talking about — and how they choose to talk about them! Pick a Minister related to your kaupapa, and have a read of some of their recent speeches. You might learn something interesting!
ONE THING YOU NEED TO KNOW
Budget Day has come and gone, but that’s far from the end of Parliament’s scrutiny of Government spending. One of the most important functions that select committees have is financial scrutiny — holding the Government to account for the way it is spending taxpayers’ money.
In May, every select committee released their first scrutiny activities reports, which explain what each committee has done to scrutinise the executive branch of government and updates their scrutiny priorities (the topics, issues, and aims the committee intends to focus on) for the rest of the Parliament.
These activity reports are a great way to understand what committees have focused on so far, and what they intend to concentrate on for the next financial scrutiny cycle. With post-Budget Day estimates hearings beginning soon, this is your chance to get an early idea of what each committee will be looking into over the coming weeks.
Pick a committee that interests you, and have a read of their activity report. Pay attention to what they’ve done so far, and compare that with what they’re going to look at in the year ahead. Has it changed? Do they explain why? Have a think about it — and keep your thoughts in mind when you read the next issue of Engage-in-Brief, where we’ll take a closer look at Parliament’s upcoming Scrutiny Week!
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ONE FUNNY THING
For a little change of pace, this issue we’re sharing something sweet! At the end of the night on Friday of Budget week, after having been sitting since 9.00 that morning, the House finally finished for the night at 1.00am. The chairperson, Greg O’Connor, finished up with these words.
The Clerk’s team is are the often-overlooked heroes of Parliament, but the House couldn’t really function without them. So it’s always nice to see them getting a shout-out — and some much deserved applause.
That’s it for this edition of Engage-in-Brief. Remember, you have a voice and you can use it! If you need training to support your advocacy efforts simply reply to this email.
Mauri ora!
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