Challenge
Written reporting in the Flemish Parliament is a very labour-intensive process. It is often a race against the clock for the two departments that guarantee it.
The Verbatim Report department is responsible for the complete, literal reports of plenary meetings and interpellations and requests for explanations in committee meetings. The reports present the discussion chronologically in direct speech and are in principle published the day itself on the website of the Flemish Parliament.
The Committee department is responsible for the (synthesis) reports of discussions of parliamentary and government initiatives and petitions as well as hearings and exchanges of views in committee meetings. These reports are also published on the website of the Flemish Parliament as quickly as possible.
In addition, the Flemish Parliament also makes a video recording of the meetings available via its website.
In order to improve the working conditions of both departments and to make their reporting faster, more efficient and more accurate, the Flemish Parliament together with PIP wanted to explore the possibilities of speech technology and automatic transcription (from speech to text). In addition, the Flemish Parliament intended to use this project - if possible - to create live subtitling of the online video reports. After all, a joint offer of images, speech and text can promote the social inclusion of all kinds of target groups. For example, Dutch-language deaf and hearing-impaired people can follow the live subtitled debates better. The same goes for foreign speakers who have difficulty with Dutch. Or elderly people, who tend to revert more quickly to subtitling.
