COMMENT | It is great to see the debate between Malaysiakini columnist Jacqueline Ann Surin and MP of Selayang William Leong Jee Keen over whether the Parliament’s special select committees can convene their meetings through teleconferencing.

It is time our media and opinion leaders look beyond the parliamentarians’ attendance and shouting matches, which are only symptoms of what is wrong with our Parliament.

As I have both read and written a bit on parliamentary democracy, allow me to join the debate.

For the benefit of those readers less familiar with the context, allow me to first explain briefly what parliamentarians do, then summarise where Surin and Leong disagree.

Why should you care? The debate involves annually some RM12 million of your money, you as taxpayers...