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Policy options template

Nepali translation awaiting review

Seven questions to work through before backing a policy, a bill or an amendment. Use it to compare at least two options, including keeping things as they are, on the same terms. It does not recommend any policy.

About 40 minutesकरिब ४० मिनेट · For: Policy teams · MPs and their staff · Citizens

Questions to work through

What problem is being addressed? General advice
Describe the problem, not the solution. Say who is affected, how many, where, and since when. If people disagree about the problem itself, write down each view.
What evidence supports it? General advice
List each figure or finding with its source, date and locator (table, page, row). Prefer official data, audit findings and court decisions; mark anything that is an estimate, a survey or an opinion. Note what evidence is missing. The source-checking exercise on this site shows how.
Which institution has authority? Checked against the rules
Check whether the subject is federal, provincial, local or shared. The Constitution lists federal powers in Schedule 5, provincial in Schedule 6, local in Schedule 8, and concurrent powers in Schedules 7 and 9. Then ask whether action needs a new law, an amendment, a regulation, a budget decision or only an administrative order, and which ministry or body would carry it out. Government of Nepal Art. 57(1)-(5) (pp. 34-35); Art. 109 (p. 59)
What alternatives exist? General advice
Set out at least two real options plus the status quo. Include lighter options (information, enforcing an existing law, changing spending) as well as new laws. Check whether an Act already covers the issue but is not being implemented.
What would implementation cost? Checked against the rules
Estimate one-off and yearly costs, which level of government pays, and from which budget head. A bill that will cost public money must carry a financial memorandum. Federal spending plans are made within medium-term ceilings, so ask what would be cut or raised to pay for it. Compare with how much similar programmes actually spent, not only what they planned. Federal Parliament Secretariat · Nepal Law Commission HoR Rules rule 100(2) (p. 48); FPFRA Sections 6-7 (p. 8)
Who benefits or bears costs? General advice
Name the groups, places and levels of government that gain or lose, now and later. Look especially at people who are not in the room: women, Dalits, Indigenous peoples, Madhesi, people with disabilities, remote areas, and future taxpayers. Note who must change behaviour and what it costs them.
How would results be measured? Checked against the rules
Choose two or three indicators, the baseline, a target date and who will publish the data. Plan a review: the budget must report whether last year's spending objectives were met, and a House committee may measure a law's implementation once it has been in force for at least two years. Government of Nepal · Federal Parliament Secretariat Const. Art. 119(2) (p. 65); HoR Rules rule 139(1) (pp. 63-64)

Hypothetical example

Hypothetical example. Problem: in an imagined municipality, many children miss school in the monsoon because a river crossing floods (figures would come from the school's attendance records). Evidence: attendance records by month, and the municipality's own list of planned works. Authority: the Constitution lists basic and secondary education and local roads among local-level powers (Schedule 8), so the municipality is a natural first decision-maker, with possible provincial or federal grants. Alternatives: (a) status quo; (b) a footbridge; (c) a monsoon school bus on a longer road; (d) flexible term dates. Cost: compare one-off and yearly costs of (b)-(d) and which budget each would come from. Who benefits or bears costs: families on the far bank benefit; taxpayers and, for (d), teachers bear costs. Measurement: monsoon attendance at the affected school compared with the baseline, published each term. The place, problem and options are invented for practice. Government of Nepal Schedule 8, items 8 and 11 (p. 200)

Key terms

Problem statement: One or two sentences saying who is affected, by what, how much and where, without naming a solution.
Option: A distinct way of addressing the problem, for example a new law, a change in spending, a regulation, information, or doing nothing new.
Status quo: What happens if nothing new is done. Every comparison should include it as a baseline.
Baseline: The measured situation before a policy starts, used later to judge change.
Indicator: A specific, measurable figure that shows whether a result is being achieved, with a source and a date.
Distributional effect: How benefits and costs fall on different groups, places or levels of government.

Limits of this guide

This is a thinking aid, not an official appraisal method; Nepal's government uses its own formats (for example the financial memorandum and medium-term expenditure framework), which this template does not replace. Only the prompts on authority, cost and measurement cite law; the rest is general guidance. Check which Schedule a subject falls under in the full constitutional text, because many subjects appear in more than one list.

Policy options template

Questions to work through

Hypothetical example

Key terms

Limits of this guide

Related on Policy Nepal

Sources