House sports new web look

The House of Representatives upped its contribution to the people’s access and freedom of information with a revitalized, user-friendly and easy to access new website.

The House recently unveiled the new website: house.gov.ph, which Inter-Parliamentary and Public Affairs Department Deputy Secretary General Darren de Jesus said, is designed to be an online repository Filipinos could visit and use regularly in this age of freedom of information and social media activism.

The House, he said, wants to respond to the demands of the younger generation.

The website is easily navigable and uses simple, easy-to-understand language to engage the public and encourage interest in legislation.

A primary feature of house.gov.ph is its mobile-friendliness as it can be viewed and used seamlessly through hand-held devices like smart phones.

Site visitors can view priority measures of the administration.

They can also track the progress of approval of bills from the committee level right up to their transmittal to the Senate.

The site also lists bills enacted during the 17th Congress.

Users can also learn how House bills are enacted into laws through a short video that can be viewed in Filipino or English.

Infographics will show the objective and key provisions of each priority bill.

The infographics can be shared on social media to help increase awareness about the measures.

Users can share their reactions to the bill right on the website, giving the House’s insight to the public thoughts.

The site shall feature specific bills for a short period of time through a video highlighting the salient points of the measures.

The public can expect the website to be further developed to contain live streams of House committee meetings.

De Jesus said the new domain is an effort to become more “politically correct.”

Under the Constitution, “Congress” refers to both chambers of the legislative branch of the government, the Senate and the House of Representatives. Despite this, the House is more commonly referred to as Congress.

The website containing information about the House and its members is under the domain congress.gov.ph.

De Jesus, however, said the old domain shall be left empty. Gradually, the content of congress.gov.ph shall be migrated to the new website so that the old domain can be an umbrella site of both the Senate and the House.