The Presidency of Minutes Services in Turkey

Introduction

Minutes services in Turkey go back a long way and have a deep-rooted history. Minutes services in the Turkish Grand National Assembly have been ongoing since 1878. In the Ottoman Empire, minutes were kept, starting with the Parliamentary Assembly and the Parliamentary Deputies. With the opening of the Grand National Assembly on 23 April 1920, minutes services continued and the foundations of today’’ minutes creation method were laid. With the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire and the establishment of the Republic of Turkey on 29 October 1923, “Turkey” was added to the Grand National Assembly and the name of the Parliament began to be expressed as the Turkish Grand National Assembly.

With the adoption of Latin letters in Turkey on 3 November 1928, minutes began to be written in Latin letters. Minutes of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey are written in accordance with the rules of the Turkish language. While performing their duties, stenographers create minutes in accordance with the rules of the Turkish language and decipher the minutes by using the Turkish dictionary and spelling guide.

Structure and Activities of the Minutes Services Presidency

One president, four vice-presidents, 72 stenographers and 27 expert stenographers work in the Record Services Directorate. Twenty-three of the expert stenographers are responsible for the work of the General Assembly. Two expert stenographers are responsible for the summary of the General Assembly minutes, and two expert stenographers are responsible for the summary of the commission minutes. Stenographers take part in the General Assembly of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, in commissions, in meetings of the presidency, in receptions of the President of the Assembly, in international meetings organised by the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, and in cases where the Constitutional Court judges in its capacity as the Supreme Court.

Stenographers must be present at the General Assembly for a total of eight minutes. The last two minutes of these eight minutes are the minutes under the responsibility of the stenographer on duty. Expert stenographers also serve in the General Assembly along with stenographers. Expert stenographers are present at the General Assembly for a total of 20 minutes and are responsible for checking the minutes written by the stenographers working during this period (see also Acar & Yayla, 2023).

In addition to the speeches made in these meetings, the speeches made by the MPs from their seats without a microphone—the words spoken to the speaker, which we call “verbal interventions”—are added to the minutes. Speeches when the microphone is cut off while the speaker is speaking, the slogans of the MPs, MPs gathering in front of the podium and applause from the party groups are added to the minutes. In this way, the course of the meeting is objectively presented. Minutes are also kept in the closed (secret) meetings of the TBMM.

In the Grand National Assembly of Turkey, minutes are written in Turkish. Speeches made in languages other than Turkish are not recorded in the minutes, except for proper names, place names, terms accepted in literature and known by everyone, and the like. In speeches made in languages other than Turkish, a footnote is added to the minutes and the statement, “In this section, the speaker expressed a non-Turkish word/words”, is added to the footnote.

Recruitment for the profession of stenographer is done through a job posting opened by the Turkish Grand National Assembly. To become a stenographer, it is necessary to graduate from universities’ law faculties, economics faculties and administrative sciences faculties. To be appointed as a stenographer, one must not be over 30 years of age. According to Civil Servants Law No. 657 in Turkey, the age limit for group A, specialist civil servants, is determined as 30 or 35. The Grand National Assembly of Turkey has also determined the age selection for the stenographer profession as 30, since the stenographer profession requires an intensive tempo.

The recruitment of stenographers is done based on the candidates’ Public Personnel Selection Examination scores. Candidates who meet these conditions are interviewed by the Turkish Grand National Assembly, and those who are successful are taken on to the stenography course. The shorthand course lasts between eight months and one year and consists of four exams; candidates who pass these exams are entitled to be appointed as an assistant stenographer. The term of an assistant stenographer is three years and a stenographer qualification exam is held at the end of the three years. Those who successfully pass this exam are appointed as stenographers. Stenographers who have worked for 12 years are appointed as expert stenographers.

Minutes Information System Project

Recently, the making of the minutes has been considerably developed with the Minutes Information System Project (TBS). It is a project that aims to carry out the work and actions with integrity and on a single system, starting from the assignment phase in the meetings where minutes need to be kept—especially the General Assembly and the commission discussions of the Turkish Grand National Assembly—until the end of the printing process, which is the last stage of the minutes.

In this context, with the Grand National Assembly’s Minutes Information System Project, the process of recording the speeches in the General Assembly and its commissions and turning them into minutes has been improved. In particular, work efficiency has been increased by automating the process of converting voice to text using artificial intelligence. In addition to speech recognition, speaker recognition is also performed. The process of transcribing all minutes will be managed on a single platform, and minute services will be made more efficient. In this project, starting with the assignment of stenographers to the relevant meetings, processes such as preparing summary minutes, creating content and creating indexes have started to be carried out electronically. Additionally, paper waste will be reduced. The data obtained as a result of the tests is immediately shared with TÜBİTAK, the project contractor company.

The Minutes Information System is divided into four subsystems. In the Stenographer Information System, job descriptions, job assignments and the duty times of stenographers working in the Parliament are announced. In the Record Process Management System, the speeches output is both checked and corrected by stenographers. The text, which is the output of speech recognition, appears on the stenographer’s screen with the voice and text synchronised. It is possible to access the relevant part of the audio recording from the text or the relevant section of the text from the audio recording. In this way, the speech corresponding to the transcript can be listened to automatically. This synchronisation will save time for the stenographer. TBS keeps a record of the changes made for traceability.

In the Minutes Management System, all minutes created in TBS are categorised. With TBS, minutes can be queried, viewed, managed and published. A combination of definitions and management, speaker identification, classification, emailing of the speech to the relevant speaker, content creation, index creation and voting management are carried out.

In the Management Panel System, the minutes written in the General Assembly and commissions under headings created by the Minutes Services Department are processed. Also, the minutes are scanned based on speaker and subject. The minutes are scanned through the index headings created, detecting the opening and closing times of the meetings and determining the number of sessions, which contributes to the minute documentation.

Conclusion

Since 1878, minute writing has been continuously developed and updated in accordance with the rules of the Turkish language. Technological developments are constantly followed. In developing technological conditions, voice recorders, microphones, computer technologies and artificial intelligence products are used.

In the system called “speech recognition”, automatic recognition of orators whose voice samples have been taken during their podium speeches will prevent confusion and enable the stenographer to work efficiently. With the Minutes Information System Project, minute-writing processes are collected on a single platform and the work of stenographers is made more efficient.

Kadriye Aktay is a stenographer of the Presidency of Minutes Services in the Grand National Assembly of Turkey.

References

Acar, A & E. Yayla (2023). The Organisation and Work Processes of the Record Office in the Grand National Assembly of Türkiye. – Tiro 1/2023. Available at https://tiro.intersteno.org/2023/07/the-organisation-and-work-processes-of-the-record-office-in-the-grand-national-assembly-of-turkiye/ 

Türkiye Büyük Millet Meclisi İçtüzüğü (2017). Ankara: TBMM Basımevi.

Türkiye Cumhuriyeti Anayasası. (2017). Ankara: TBMM Basımevi.

Tutanak Hizmetleri El Kitabı. (2016). Ankara: TBMM Basımevi.