Members of Cambodia’s National Assembly will today sit down with a senior clerk from the UK Houses of Parliament as a two-day consultative meeting gets underway in Phnom Penh.

Today will see a discussion of political party groups, while women in parliament is on the agenda for tomorrow.

Senior clerk Gosia McBride, who arrived in Cambodia last week, will share experiences from the UK, such as how multi-party political groups are organised, as well as methods on how to increase female lawmakers’ participation in parliament.

Since her March 25 arrival, McBride has been working on a UK-Cambodia capacity building project, as well as meeting with senior Cambodian parliamentarians and organisations that work with the National Assembly, according to a press release from the British Embassy.

The discussion of improving women’s participation in politics is set to a backdrop of minimal gains over the past 12 years. In 2003, one of Cambodia’s UN Millennium Developments Goals was for an increase in female lawmakers. At that time, 19 per cent of National Assembly members were women. Today, women represent just 20 per cent.