Venicea for Speaker
Staying on top of Things
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Salutations, prosperous nations!
Some of you may already know me but for those of you who don't: I am Venicea, and like many of you I am a citizen of the North Pacific. I am also a Deputy Speaker, having served in this capacity under @East Isles, whom I thank for the great opportunity he has given me, and a Deputy Minister of Home Affairs, under @New Celoveniortan.
I think that, during my time in the Speaker's Office, I have shown myself to be capable and professional, performing my duties, from citizenship and residency checks to counting RA votes, with consistency and dedication, maintaining an active and constant presence, to the point of going far beyond what was required of me and working almost every day of the week, instead of just the one I was assigned.
Whenever a task needed to be done, another deputy needed someone to cover for them, there was a backlog of citizenship applications or the Speaker needed someone to count votes, I was there.
I believe in what the Speaker's Office does and represents, I have passion for this job and it is with this very same passion that I am here today before you, my fellow TNPers, asking for your support as I am running for Speaker of the Regional Assembly.
I'm a very practical person and for this reason, and in continuity with those of many previous Speaker candidates, my campaign is not built on impossible goals or grand promises. I intend instead to continue a tradition that, from @St George, who restored the office after Deropia's term, passing through @Robespierre and @East Isles, the incumbent Speaker and my mentor, has come down to me. I am satisfied with the current structure of the Speaker's Office, thus I don't see any need for a substantial change to it or the way it operates nor do I see a compelling enough reason to bring back the obsolete Speaker's Staff.
As done in recent terms, I plan to appoint at least 5 Deputy Speakers to assist me in all of my duties and while I do hope to retain a few deputies with prior experience in the Office, I would also endeavour to train anyone who shows the willingness to serve and contribute to our region. Cultivating new talent to potentially serve as future Speakers is of paramount importance and one of my main goals. After all I wouldn't be here today if East hadn't taught and prepared me, and for this I will always be grateful.
That said, while I like the way the office currently works I believe that there is room for improvement, especially in term of activity and engagement and it can't be denied that, during last term, we've fallen off the horse in some areas: for example, some good projects like the "State of the Regional Assembly" or the "Speakership Performance Review Poll" (both introduced by Robespierre) were discontinued, the Speaker's Desk thread hasn't been updated in two months and the office hasn't performed enough internal audits to remedy all the discrepancies that unfortunately have arisen on the Citizen/Resident registry spreadsheet.
As a Deputy I have distinguished myself by my ability to work hard. If elected, I would continue to commit my time and energy to make the Speaker's Office a well-oiled, active and responsive machine capable of meeting the needs of the region without making drastic changes or distorting its structure.
Without further ado, I propose below the main points of my campaign, organized, for clarity's sake, in macro-areas:
- Citizenship applications and checks: Theoretically, citizenship applications should be processed as fast as possible, with the Speaker's check being the first one to be completed. This is important mainly for two reasons: firstly, the speed and readiness with which applications are processed plays a key role in player retention and whether or not an applicant will stay or be active in TNP. Secondly, both the Admins and Vice Delegate can use the Pending Citizenship Applications tab as a reference, thus increasing the speed and accuracy of their respective checks. Checks on residency and RMB and forum activity should occur as frequently as possible, and be performed on a daily basis, at the very least, if not twice per day after major and minor updates. Throughout my entire term as a Deputy I have worked hard and done everything in my power to ensure that residency and activity checks were performed on a daily basis and that applications were processed swiftly for the entire term. As Speaker I would demand the same level of commitment and readiness from my deputies. For the sake of order and structure I would keep the weekly schedule, which I'd promptly publish in the Speaker's Desk thread, but I'd also give my deputies more autonomy: if applications are not processed within 12 hours or if an applicant has passed all three checks and is just waiting to be granted citizenship, then any member of my office would be allowed to process such application, even if it's not their scheduled day.
- Transparency and accountability: The Speaker's office, despite its general efficiency, is far from perfect and mistakes are made. During this term we performed, on my request, one audit which led to the discovery of an issue in the way we were editing the sheet and the removal of 35 citizens that should have lost citizenship. While this specific issue has been correctly identified and definitively resolved it wasn't enough: just a couple days agoI found out that two members of this forum were still masked as citizens despite their nations having ceased to exist (39 and 72 days ago respectively) and their names having been removed from the sheet, yet there was no trace of their loss of citizenship in the relevant thread or on the Citizens Stats tab, before my post. It goes without saying that these types of errors are very serious and inadmissible in an office that aspires to the highest standards of excellence and that, if elected, I would undertake to perform monthly audits whose results would be posted in the Speaker's Desk thread, just like during Robespierre's term. Transparency and accountability are two concepts that are very dear to me and it is precisely in the name of these two concepts that I'd like to bring back two projects, both introduced by Robespierre that were abandoned during this term: the "State of the Regional Assembly" reports and the "Speakership Performance Review Poll", both on a bi-monthly basis. The former is, in my opinion, an excellent tool for assessing the health status of our legislative body and increase the visibility of all data we collect and record daily in the Citizen Stat tab, while the latter is needed to receive the necessary feedback so that we can carry out our work in a way that suits our region.
- Legislation: The Speaker is first of all a government official whose most important duty is protecting the interests of the Regional Assembly and its members, the citizens. I would serve the citizenry primarily by being an active presence in our legislative body, able to respond to motions and count votes in a timely manner, so as not to delay our legislative process in any way. At the same time I believe in a parliamentary approach and that the Speaker should encourage debate on both legislative and non-legislative motions, regardless of who the author or what the subject of such motion is. I would ensure that no motion is put to the vote too quickly and that there is always sufficient time for any objections or questions. This is particularly important for non-legislative motions (especially appointments) for which there is no formal debate and therefore could be rushed to vote without proper scrutiny. For these motions the role of the Speaker, who is guaranteed wide discretion on the timing of the vote, is fundamental. That being said, I do not have, at the moment, any concrete plan to review the Standing Procedures on the matter, as I believe greater flexibility is necessary with regard to non-legislative motions as opposed to legislative ones and treaty ratifications. Finally, I would like to say that I am a firm supporter of the idea that the Speaker must be a neutral figure, and as such I would commit myself to always vote "abstain" on all legislative and non-legislative motions.
- Housekeeping: This is perhaps a less exciting topic but still one of vital importance for an office that wants to be efficient. Like Robespierre in his Speaker campaign, I too would undertake, if elected, to update the templates used by our office, which are still those provided by MadJack, in order to adapt them to any normative changes. In addition, I would like to expand the range of templates available to us, in order to be ready for any situation, for example in the case of assorted motions (we don't really have a template for those). As part of this this housekeeping work I also intend to do a thorough cleaning of the Regional Assembly forum, archiving inactive discussion threads that have not been posted in for a very long time or whose motions have been put to a vote and passed, as well as voting floor topics that were closed more than 6 months ago. Considering that a cleaning operation of this magnitude has not been carried out since Madjack's term (December 2020) I think it's time for someone to take care of it.
To conclude: I know what this job entails and what the region expects from me and the Office. I do realism: I know what I can offer and that's what I'm offering you, nothing more and nothing less. I am aware that, especially in the beginning, I will have to face complex challenges but I'm also confident that I and the team I'll build will be able to prove ourselves up to the task and give you all what you deserve: a Speakership able to stay on top of things.
I thank you for your kind attention and, of course, I remain at your disposal for any questions, concerns, comments etc.
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