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During the video conference, the business representatives and government officials discussed the progress of the "regulatory guillotine" scheme implementation, enhancing efficiency of interaction between the business community and the government in improving controlling and regulatory and permitting activities, status of the draft laws on state and municipal control (supervision), and other issues.

In his introductory speech, Alexander Shokhin, President of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP), appealed to the federal executive authorities involved in implementation of controlling and supervisory activities reform to form jointly with the business by-laws in pursuance of the draft laws on state control and on mandatory requirements considered by the State Duma.

The "regulatory guillotine" scheme implementation stipulating large-scale update of the mandatory requirements from January 1, 2021 requires that the federal executive authorities form future regulation structure and regulations preparation schedule.

Next week, the State Duma of Russia is expected to adopt the draft laws on state control and on mandatory requirements introduced by the Russian Government, Alexander Shokhin reminded.

"The draft laws prepared for the second reading turned out to be balanced in general and to take into account the interests of various parties involved in controlling and regulatory activities. However, some provisions of the draft law on state control still cause concern of the business community. In particular, the following may be noted: mandatory pre-court procedure for appealing against actions of the controlling and supervisory authorities (to be introduced from 2023); possibility to initiate controlling and supervisory measures if any threat to cause harm to protected objects of value during preventive measures is detected; reducing time of notice of scheduled field inspection from three days to twenty-four hours. A wide list of exceptions to the law is also a source of concern", the RSPP President said.

According to him, during the pandemic, the Russian Government showed high dynamics in work and coordination with the business, which may be also applied to controlling activities reform and mandatory requirements updating.

Besides, Alexander Shokhin pointed out that the "regulatory guillotine" may be considered as one of the national state projects by its effect on economic development.

According to Valery Kazikaev, Chairman of the RSPP Committee for Permitting and Regulatory and Controlling Activities, Member of the Board of Directors METALLOINVEST Management Company, due to the Government’s moratorium, from January to April 2020, the number of inspections of small and medium-sized businesses reduced against the similar period of the last year by 38%. "When comparing April 2019 and April 2020, such reduction is 85% in total", he stated.

"We saw that the consumers were not affected by the reduction in the government’s attention to the activities of small and medium-sized businesses. This experience confirms that the companies can responsibly fulfil the government’s requirements on their own", he said.

Valery Kazikaev called "superconcentration" a specific feature of state control in Russia. For example, more than 5 thousand inspections are conducted in 20 types of state control out of 241 types. At the same time, a quarter of types of state control is not exercised at all. 25% of all inspections are conducted regarding the companies in six constituent entities of the Russian Federation only. 75% of all federal inspections are conducted by only four federal agencies out of 48.

Head of the Federal Environmental, Industrial and Nuclear Supervision Service Alexey Aleshin briefly outlined the results of the agency’s work for the first half of the year and told about their plans for the future period.

"Based on the rating of the entities under our supervision, now we identified among them those which actually need visiting (for inspection — editor’s note). We completed formation of a list of businesses that must be inspected without fail as the accident at Norilsk Nickel showed", Alexey Aleshin said.

He clarified that the operations of 931 potentially dangerous facilities were suspended by the end of the first half of the year.

"Last year, there were 10 % less of such facilities by this date. In fact, we are talking about prevented accidents and thousands of saved lives. This year we will more closely interact with in-process monitoring departments at the companies", Alexey Aleshin emphasized.<…>

Alexander Sitnikov, Managing Partner of Vegas Lex, reported on how to make the businessmen’s lives easier beyond using "regulatory guillotine".

"One of the key initiatives is to arrange the anti-corruption rating of Russian business of RSPP. This is a method of so-called soft control when a business may arrange self-examination and self-control measures on its own initiative. Business should be more actively involved in self-control methods. 50 largest companies will take part in the Anti-Corruption Rating and the results of their examination will be presented in September 2020", Alexander Sitnikov said.

The meeting was also attended by Irina Ulyanova, Director of the Regulatory Policy and Legislation Development Department of the Ministry of Justice of Russia, Valery Seleznev, First Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Energy, Oleg Nikolaenko, Advisor to the General Director of Gazprom Neft, Igor Bukharov, President of the Federation of Restaurateurs and Hoteliers, Rinat Gizatulin, Deputy General Director of Uralchem.

Full text of the article may be found here: https://fas.gov.ru/publications/21305