Congress to broadcast traffic discussion session online

The Standing Committee of the Beijing Municipal People's Congress will on Friday broadcast a meeting regarding traffic congestion live over the Internet. This will be first time that the committee has made one of its sessions a public webcast.

Members of the committee will on Friday morning have a deliberative session regarding the municipal government's report on how it dealt with representatives' proposals regarding the traffic congestion issue.

The committee decided to webcast the process of the deliberation as the issue is one of public concern and is an urgent problem facing the city, the Beijing Youth Daily reported Monday.

A staff member from the committee told the Global Times that the webcast would be a live video of the session on the official website of the committee.

"It's a good practice as it extends openness to a greater extent, and increases the opportunity for people to participate in political affairs," Ren Jianming, a professor from the School of Public Policy and Management at Tsinghua University, told the Global Times, noting that the degree of transparency within government is often limited, and regulations regarding this field only cover governments while excluding legislative organs and Party officials.

Ren said that the Internet has reduced the cost of extending democracy and the practice should be made a regular requirement instead of just used for certain subjects. He also said there should be more interaction with Web users.

In contrast to the previous format, where members were divided into groups to discuss the issues, this session will consist of a large group discussion with all members.

The standing committee of the Shanghai Municipal People's Congress for the first time broadcast a session via Sina Weibo on September 18. The topic was services for the aging population.