In the year 2000, the Inter-Parliamentary Union (the IPU) published a very important document - Guidelines for the Content and Structure of Parliamentary Websites - to foster good practices in the creation of a communication tool that was becoming increasingly important to legislatures. The IPU Guidelines have served parliaments well for a number of years, but the authors themselves recognized that they would eventually need to be updated. As the introduction to the Guidelines states: “Internet technology is constantly evolving. It will be necessary to review and update the Guidelines in the light of future developments.” That time has now come. With the advances in technology during the past 10 years, it is important to update the guidelines to reflect the best current and emerging practices in today’s websites.

• Download: Guidelines for Parliamentary Websites

Objectives and role

The goal of the Working Group on Guidelines for Parliamentary Websites is to support the updating of the guidelines by providing a forum for sharing different expertise and experiences and for exchanging views throughout the elaboration process. The members of the Working Group will work collaboratively towards the formulation of a new set of guidelines for parliamentary websites, taking the initial IPU guidelines as a basis for discussion and providing input based on the Group members’ knowledge and experience of how parliaments are currently using, and envisaging to use, modern web technologies to disseminate parliamentary information internally and externally, and communicating with citizens.

• Working Group online wiki