DEPARTMENTAL OVERVIEW

ROLE AND FUNCTIONS

The Department of the Parliamentary Reporting Staff (DPRS) is one of five departments which comprise the Parliamentary Service and directly support the Parliament. The Presiding Officers of the Parliament (President of the Senate, Senator the Hon. Margaret Reid and Speaker of the House of Representatives, the Hon. Neil Andrew MP) have, under the Parliamentary Service Act 1999, joint responsibility for the department. They exercise similar powers to a Minister of an executive department and the Secretary is responsible to the Presiding Officers for the management of the department.

The department's vision is:

To give all Australians the opportunity to see, hear and read the work of their national Parliament

The department's task is:

To provide the Australian Parliament with world class, value for money services and support

Departmental aims

The aims of the department are:

• to supply competitive, world class services
• to make our services easy to find and easy to use
• to constantly look for better ways of providing services
• to use all our resources economically and effectively
• to share knowledge and ideas and
• to value all staff and their contributions.

Departmental services

The department provides a range of complex and integrated reporting, information technology and communication services to Senators, Members, Ministers, parliamentary committees, the Parliamentary Service and external users such as educational institutions, libraries, commercial and professional organisations and the media.

The department provides the following specific services:

• central computing networks and infrastructure
• parliament-wide databases, which are available both in Parliament House and, in many instances, on the Internet
• management of the Extended Parliamentary Network (EPN) which connects Senators' and Members' Parliament House offices to their electorate offices
• information technology training, desktop support and consultancy services
• telecommunications services, including telephone and facsimile
• Hansard reports of proceedings in the House of Representatives, the Senate and the Main Committee of the House of Representatives
• Hansard transcripts of hearings of parliamentary committees
• internal and external television broadcasts of proceedings of the chambers and committees
• internal and external radio broadcasts of proceedings of the chambers and committees
• teleconferencing, videoconferencing and audiovisual services
• television production services for Senators, Members and the parliamentary administration
• related electronic services, including division lights, bells, clocks, Senators' and Members' pagers and the public address and emergency warning intercom systems.

Departmental outcome

The Presiding Officers have approved the following Outcome for the department:

The Commonwealth Parliament to have international standard broadcasting, transcription and information technology services and the Australian community to be able to see, hear and read the work of the Parliament.