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Training Module: Preparing the Speaker's Brief

Training Module: Preparing the Speaker's Brief

Introduction

Generating the NI Speaker's Brief

Exercises

Getting started

Before you can complete this exercise you should complete Training Module: Generating a Grouping List as this will provide you with the bill, amendments and groups you need to prepare a Speaker’s Brief.

Exercise 1: Generate the Speaker’s Brief at Consideration Stage

Once the Groups have been assigned, you are ready to generate a Speaker’s Brief. Most of it is auto-populated, however there are some necessary updates you will need to make.

Step 1: Generate the list and update the pre-populated rubric

Generate a Speaker’s Brief, selecting Consideration Stage and update the auto-populated list when it loads in the Editor.

  1. From the Amendment Manager, select Amendment Actions > Create Official List

  2. On the create amendment list dialog box, select Speaker’s Brief at Consideration Stage giving it a unique name e.g. SB - CS

  3. The Speaker’s Brief will appear in a new tab in the Editor, containing all auto-populated text.

  4. Update the pre-populated rubric e.g.—

    1. concatenating the amendment numbers,

    2. adding additional procedural notes or mutually exclusive notes in the Intro box

    3. updating chairperson and/or minister names in the group boxes

Step 2: Insert spaces between paragraphs

Lawmaker hasn’t automated the spaces between paragraphs yet so you will need to manually insert them

  1. Insert space between paragraphs by using keyboard short-cut SHIFT+Enter

  2. Leave the ‘Text’ element that is inserted empty and a space will be created in the PDF

Step 3: Add some options

Recreate the following option scenario—

image-20250217-152127.png

  1. Place your cursor in the right-hand margin on the right-hand side of Proposer Gary Middleton’s name (if you click on the proposer’s name, the ‘Update Member’ dialog box opens which is not required)

  2. Use the right arrow on your keyboard to move the cursor through the elements working your way from Proposer in the breadcrumb:

    image-20250217-151403.png

    to List body:

    image-20250217-151430.png

  3. When your cursor is in the List body, click Enter to view the insert menu and select Options intro - amendment

  4. Update the pre-populated text with the text in the screenshot above

  5. With your cursor anywhere in the options intro text, click Enter again to view the insert menu and select Option start - red

  6. Update the pre-populated text with the text in the screenshot above

  7. Place your cursor at the end of AMENDMENT 2 - ALREADY DEBATED box and click Enter to view the insert menu and select Option end - red

  8. Update the pre-populated text with the text in the screenshot above

  9. With your cursor anywhere in the options intro text, click Enter again to view the insert menu and select Option start - blue

  10. Update the pre-populated text with the text in the screenshot above

  11. With your cursor anywhere in the option start text, click Enter again to view the insert menu and select Empty box

  12. Update the heading placeholder element with AMENDMENT 2 - NOT CALLED and delete the subheading placeholder and type in the text according to the screenshot above

  13. With your cursor inside the AMENDMENT 2 - NOT CALLED box, click Enter to view the insert menu and select Option end - blue

  14. Update the pre-populated text with the text in the screenshot above

You can use SHIFT + Enter to insert blank lines between options if desired

Step 4: Abridge amendment 3

Some amendments can be long and you may want to abridge them to save printing.

  1. Find amendment 3 in the structure view

  2. Click on the toggle to show lower levels and drill down into amendment 3 until you can see the subsections

    image-20250217-155239.png
    image-20250217-155336.png

     

  3. Highlight subsections (2) to (4) (holding down CTRL and clicking with your mouse to multi-select the provisions) and delete

  4. With your cursor at the end of subsection (1), insert a second sentence by using SHIFT + Enter

  5. In the empty Text element, type in full amendment text as per Marshalled List

  6. When you have finished making updates, save and close the list using the Close Editor button

  7. From the Project tab, generate a PDF by selecting Actions > Generate PDF and send the document for official checks.

Exercise 2: Generate the Speaker’s Brief at Further Consideration Stage

You can generate a Further Consideration stage Speaker’s Brief to see how it differs from the Consideration stage version.

  1. From the Amendment Manager, select Amendment Actions > Create Official List

  2. On the create amendment list dialog box, select Speaker’s Brief at Further Consideration Stage, giving it a unique name e.g. SB - FCS

  3. The Speaker’s Brief will appear in a new tab in the Editor, containing all auto-populated text.

The Further Consideration Stage Speaker’s Brief will not include the 'Clause/Schedule/Long Title Stand Part boxes

The FCS Speaker’s Brief we created in this exercise includes a stand part motion, but that’s only because we included one in the training data. In real life, you would have a ‘leave out clause x’ amendment instead.

It might be easier to perform final formatting edits using Word. You will need to save the PDF locally and open it in Word to be able to utilise Word’s editing features.

When complete…

Move onto Training Module: Preparing the Annotated Marshalled List