Alfian, Jakarta – The House of Representatives' plenary session is not an efficient forum to debate public issues, said political experts and commentators on Wednesday.

The commentators each said greater transparency in bill deliberation was essential to improve the performance of legislators.

Muhammad Qodari, a political observer from Indo Barometer political survey institute, said using the House's plenary session as a debating forum was inefficient – especially to pass bills in time.

"There are 550 legislators and they must have thousands opinions," Muhammad said. "Too many interruptions may slow down the process of deliberation. Even with the current system – in which public issues are discussed through levels including special committee, working committee, and commission – the House was unable to meet its 2007 legislation target," he said.

The Center for Indonesian Law and Policy Studies (PSHK) in early December 2007 said House and government achievement levels for 2007, in terms of legislation quantity, was low. "The House and government only passed 40 from 78 targeted bills," the center said in a media release.

Senior researcher at PSHK, Bivitri Susanti, said both in the US and countries adopting parliamentary systems, plenary sessions were used for decision making only.

"The debates are conducted at a commission level for practicality sake," Bivitri said. "So it is not a matter of parliamentary or presidential systems," she said.

Muhammad said he regretted the House's low productivity in passing bills. He said the House's legislation function was essential to "build good systems".

The idea of using the plenary season as a forum for debating public issues, instead of decision making, was floated by House Speaker Agung Laksono. Agung said many legislators were reluctant to attend the plenary session because it was boring and a time-waster.

Agung's idea was supported by Effendy Choirie, leader of the National Awakening Party (PKB) faction at the House. "The plenary session so far has been long and trivial," Choirie told Detik.com. Choirie urged the House to immediately reformulate its internal regulations to support the change.

But executive director of the Center for Electoral Reform Hadar N. Gumay said changing the plenary's mechanism was actually not essential to improve the House's performance.

"The biggest problem is in the stages before the plenary session," Hadar said. "The deliberation of bills has yet to be made transparent for the public. For example, the deliberation of a recently passed bill around a political party was conducted mainly during closed-door meetings. The House even held some of the meetings outside Jakarta, which made it seem legislators were trying to avoid media coverage."

Hadar said the United States' legislative system saw debates conducted at the commission level. But he said the final decision was based on voting and involved all legislators.

"In the US, the legislators' final decision is no longer a party decision, but an individual decision by which their track records are documented," Hadar said. "Indonesian legislators still perceive themselves as party representatives rather than representatives of the public."