Lingsoft assists the Finnish Parliament's Records Office in remote work using a speech recognition service

In the beginning of April, Lingsoft had the pleasure of starting a unique cooperation: We will help the experts at Parliament's Records Office to work remotely with Lingsoft's speech recognition service! Due to the exceptional circumstances, the Records Office has started working remotely, and Lingsoft is offering speech recognition services to the Records Office until the end of June.

The Finnish Parliament’s Records Office prepares the minutes of the Parliament's plenary sessions. The minutes include reliable records of the discussions, decisions and other events of the plenary session in a form as original as possible.  The objective is to promote the transparency and communication of Parliament.

The minutes of the plenary sessions are published in the Parliament's online service on an up-to-date basis during the plenary session already so that the first version of the minutes - including video recordings - is available within a couple of hours from the plenary session. Plenary weeks are often busy and the sessions long, and the quality and reliability of the minutes must be ensured in any situation.

The exceptional circumstances of this spring emphasise the importance and complexity of the work of the Records Office: The Records Office helps decision-makers, citizens and the media remotely, sometimes in even several sessions in day, from dawn to dusk.

The Parliament piloted Lingsoft's speech recognition service in autumn 2019, aiming to investigate how speech recognition and quality checkers could facilitate and speed up the production of minutes and the translation process. As the results were promising, the trial of the service will now continue in remotely working offices for the next three months during these exceptional circumstances. In remote working conditions, speech recognition is expected to significantly reduce the workload.

For our part, it is an honor to support the Parliament in its important legislative work - and the Records Office in the documentation and distribution of this work!