As global public debt reaches unprecedented levels, the role of parliaments in overseeing borrowing decisions has become increasingly vital. Yet in many countries, these legislative bodies remain sidelined, lacking the tools, transparency, or institutional strength to provide effective oversight. Recognising this democratic and accountability gap, the Westminster Foundation for Democracy (WFD) is advancing a comprehensive approach to empower parliaments. Through an innovative assessment tool and targeted research, WFD is equipping legislatures to better scrutinise debt policy, ensure accountability, and safeguard long-term economic resilience.

 The high stakes of public borrowing

Low- and middle-income countries currently borrow more and at higher costs than at any other point in history. This reduces investment in essential public goods and services, placing a majority of these countries in high debt vulnerability. As the fiscal space shrinks, development priorities are set aside, private sector lending is crowded out, and growth is constrained. Overall, more than a third of the world’s population now lives in countries where their government spends more on debt service than on health or education.

Unsustainable and untransparent public debt represents a democratic deficit. It can lead to instability and social unrest sparked by fiscal cuts and increases in the cost of living.

Resolving this crisis requires a fundamental shift in oversight and accountability for how governments borrow and manage debt.

Leveraging legislative power for fiscal accountability

Parliaments are critical fiscal policy institutions with unique oversight responsibilities. Yet their ability to exercise these responsibilities depends largely on debt transparency and institutional capacity.

WFD has taken a leadership role in generating insight and crafting and deploying global tools that empower parliaments to play their rightful oversight role:

• First, WFD has created and piloted its Public Debt Management Assessment Toolkit (PDMAT).
• Second, WFD has published a Public Debt Integrity Series of 13 research papers on African parliaments’ oversight of public debt, in partnership with AFRODAD.

The case for benchmarking legislative debt oversight

Public debt is not just a fiscal matter. It shapes the political and economic trajectory of nations.
Yet too often, borrowing decisions are taken with limited transparency, little legislative input, and minimal public engagement.When left unchecked, opaque and unaccountable debt accumulation can exacerbate poverty, entrench inequality, and heighten fiscal crises. Parliaments are well-positioned to counter these trends: they legislate borrowing frameworks, scrutinise budgets, and approve or reject loan agreements. However, their effectiveness in these roles varies widely.

Measuring this effectiveness is vital. Without benchmarks, gaps in oversight remain hidden, and reform efforts may lack direction. This is where the PDMAT steps in, a toolkit developed to help parliaments assess their strengths and weaknesses through 67 indicators across nine dimensions, including debt transparency, legal frameworks, fiscal risk management, and public participation​.

Many of these PDMAT indicators were drawn from 4 public financial management (PFM) assessment tools: (1) The Debt Management Performance Assessment (DeMPA); (2) The debt transparency Heat Map by the World Bank; (3) The Public Expenditure Financial Accountability (PEFA) framework for assessing PFM; and (4) The International Budget Partnership’s Open Budget Survey.

Scaling parliamentary oversight across borders

WFD has partnered with parliaments to apply the PDMAT in Kenya, Uganda, Sierra Leone, Nigeria, and Albania. Each assessment resulted in critical insights into how oversight mechanisms function or fall short.

• In Kenya, WFD and the Institute for Public Finance (IPF) conducted an assessment that revealed a need for periodic review and approval of the Medium-Term Debt Strategy (MTDS). This ensured adaptability to changing economic conditions and the need for the Annual Borrowing Plan (ABP) to include a list of loans to be financed in each budget cycle, which would be submitted to parliament before parliament approves the budget estimates.
• In Uganda, the assessment conducted by WFD in cooperation with the World Bank showed that while the legal framework is relatively robust, gaps persist in mid-year debt reporting and oversight of State-Owned Enterprises (SOEs). Audit mechanisms were found to be underutilised, with few public hearings on debt performance and limited follow-up to audit findings​.
• In Sierra Leone, the assessment conducted by WFD in partnership with the Parliamentary Budget Office highlighted that parliament has limited involvement in the scrutiny of loan agreements. There was also limited oversight of fiscal risks related to SOEs, and the government would benefit from enhanced reporting on contingent liabilities related to Public-Private Partnerships.
• In Nigeria, WFD’s assessment found that key debt documents, such as the medium-term debt strategy and the annual borrowing plan, are not published or tabled in parliament, which plays a limited role in the scrutiny of loan agreements. It was identified that in the short term, parliament could upscale its scrutiny role by reviewing annual debt reports or similar documents to assess new loan commitments.
• Albania’s assessment flagged urgent issues with SOEs and contingent liabilities, which indicated that parliamentary oversight could be improved in the execution and audit stages of the budget cycle. A dedicated committee was created to monitor loan-financed projects.

These country analyses demonstrate that strengthening oversight is not a one-size-fits-all endeavour. The PDMAT provides the structure for identifying tailored reforms based on context-specific findings.

Building an accountability ecosystem on debt

Improving parliamentary oversight of public debt is not just about parliament. It requires an accountability ecosystem. Supreme audit institutions and civil society have a role to play. WFD’s Public Debt Management Assessment Toolkit makes this ecosystem visible and measurable.

The reports from Albania, Uganda, and Kenya each recommend closer cooperation between parliaments and auditors general, alongside improved public access to debt information. In Sierra Leone, public hearings are becoming more common but have yet to translate into legislative influence. Across all countries, civil society remains a largely untapped partner in scrutinising borrowing.

Global research, local impact

WFD’s collaboration with AFRODAD to produce the Public Debt Integrity Series further anchors our work on public debt management in thought leadership and practical reform. The series of 13 papers explores how parliamentary oversight intersects with development outcomes, transparency, and accountability.

For instance, Abraham E. Nwankwo’s paper calls for debt productivity plans – linking debt to measurable economic outcomes – to be included in debt management strategies and reviewed by parliaments​. Ben Cormier’s paper urges a closer look at the political economy of borrowing, arguing that without tackling the fiscal-policy incentives behind debt accumulation, oversight will remain weak, no matter the legal powers on paper​. Abdul-Gafar Tobi Oshodi’s paper examines the parliamentary oversight of Chinese loans in Ghana and Nigeria.

The paper by Bernard Njiri and Ruth Kendagor takes a comparative approach in exploring the role that parliament plays in controlling public debt throughout the budget cycle, that is the planning and fiscal strategy development, approval, execution and audit phases, and identifying the processes’ outcomes, constraints, and examples.

Conclusion: from transparency to transformation

By driving this body of work, WFD is not only contributing to stronger institutions in partner countries but also strengthening the UK’s relationships and providing a strong UK voice in establishing global standards in public debt management. The UK’s support, through the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), enables this unique intersection of research, policy reform, and democratic capacity building.

As debt burdens continue to mount globally, transparency alone is not enough. Parliaments must move from passive observers to active participants in shaping debt policy. Tools like the PDMAT, which WFD is pioneering, provide a feasible roadmap. But the journey requires continued investment in the broader ecosystem, where legislatures, auditors, and citizens collaborate to make public borrowing truly accountable.