The General Secretary of the National Assembly Mr Ivan Slavchov has met the representatives of the European Commission Philip Hat and Mina Shoilekova to discuss the final results of the project “Modern parliamentary administration in service of society”. The latter was funded through the EU OP “Administrative Capacity”.

Mr. Philip Hat is head of the Department for Romania, Bulgaria and Malta in the Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities of the European Commission, while Mina Shoilekova is director of  the program: ”Policies of the European Union” in the same department of the Directorate.

The project file No A09-31-144-C/12.06.2009 titled “Modern parliamentary administration in service of society” was co-funded through the European Social Fund and amounted to BGN 587 683,85. It aims at satisfying the needs of people and businesses and at improving the capacity of the National Assembly’s administration. The main goal was to achieve better satisfaction on the part of society with the work of the parliamentary administration by introducing electronic tools of governance.

At the meeting, Secretary Slavchov noted that the project was finalized successfully and in time, in the previewed 18 months term of 12.06.2009 – 11.12.2010. The project was prepared and granted during the 40^th NA and implemented by the 41^st NA. He informed the guests about the new structure of the parliamentary administration. He explained how the funds of the project were used. One forth of the administration staff from all departments was included in educational courses.

On his part Mr. Hat noticed how important was for citizens to be content with the services rendered by the administration and emphasized that the main goals of the processes of modernization and optimization were to achieve the same and better services with less personnel. In his view the successful implementation of the project “Modern parliamentary administration in service of society” is of great importance and could serve as basis for future ones.

The guests visited the Information and Administrative Services Center of the National Assembly. The Center has introduced the so called “one window” service for the public, the business and the NGOs.

Two interactive information terminals were created with funds from the project. Through these terminals citizens have access to the whole information and services available at and through the Internet portal of the National Assembly free of charge.

The funds of the project were also used to create the so called “virtual office” for citizens. The published e-mail addresses and questionnaire ensure feed-back with the administration. The present web based integrated information system of the National Assembly was upgraded, the web site modernized. It supports access for people with disabilities, easier search, mobile phone version, English language version, as well as an automatic access to part of the integrated information system data, the MPs voting and registration data and video archives. The project funds had helped the electronic publishing of the transcripts of the 36^th, 37^th, 38^th and 39^th National Assembly.