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Prime Minister Vladimir Putin holds a government meeting

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Vladimir Putin's opening address:

Good afternoon,

To begin our meeting I'd like to tell you about a rare piece of pleasant news. Mr Ottavio Cinquanta, president of the International Skating Union (ISU), called us today and then sent an official report to accept the Russian bid to host the next world figure skating championships in Moscow.

It will take place in Moscow from April 24 to May 1 of this year. On behalf of the Russian government, and all sports and figure skating fans, I'd like to thank the members of the ISU and its executive committee for making the decision in favour of the Russian Federation. We had six rivals, including Canada, France, Austria and Finland. Obviously, they are also leaders in sports in general and in figure skating in particular. But I'd like to reassure all our friends and partners that their figure skaters and all the participants and guests of the championships will feel at home in Moscow. This is the first competition on such a scale for our current team because it consists of very young figure skaters. In effect, this is a junior team but for them this is the beginning of a long journey in sports and the start of preparations for the 2014 Olympic Games.

I'd like to request the Sports Ministry and its head Mr Vitaly Mutko to urgently draft a government directive on establishing an organising committee and adopting all other necessary measures to prepare for this major international competition. I'm confident that it will be held in Russia at the highest possible level.

Now let's return to current issues. I'd like to discuss in more detail the first item of the agenda. We'll have to analyse the results of the efforts to improve the system of government management and to see what effects have been produced by the steps we've taken in this field in the last two years. There are many problems and I'll speak about them now. In general, I have the impression that no matter what we do we eliminate some problems but let new ones arise.

However, this does not mean that we should do nothing to this end. This means we should be all the more persistent. This is what we should be ready to do.

I must say right away that the adjustment of the state machine is a complex and time-consuming process. It is difficult to expect instant results here as we do when cancelling or imposing a specific tax, for example. Let me repeat that it is not enough to amend the legislation or administrative regulations – we must change the mentality guiding the work of the state machine. It was obvious that the bureaucratic apparatus, numerous regulations and procedures need to be seriously revised. I'd like to emphasise that this major project is far from being over and, as I've already said, we are determined to continue it.

What did we see when we started addressing this problem in detail? It turned out that the regulatory authorities had developed links with a host of so-called pocket companies affiliated with officials. The procedures for issuing all kinds of permits and approvals are murky and confusing. They are feeding corruption and help corrupt officials pull money from the pockets of people and private companies. Moreover, numerous inspections and formal monitoring by no means ensure the safety of facilities and production or the quality of goods.

Getting simple public services or documents from the government requires people to wait in long lines and be humiliated. Last year we held many special meetings to review the state of affairs in the government control and supervision of education, agriculture, healthcare and construction. First of all, we revised in detail controlling and licensing functions in 13 major fields of operation. Following these revisions we have drafted a big package of specific proposals and legislative initiatives. Thus, we have considerably reduced the list of documents required to license educational activities and we simplified the order and approval of documents pertaining to territorial planning and the issue of construction permits. We have improved the procedures for issuing passports, registering transport vehicles and passing motor vehicle inspections. Also, we have amended the agreements on the Customs Union. Starting this year, quarantine import permits have been cancelled and the procedure for issuing veterinary documents on agricultural produce has been simplified on the borders of Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus.

In addition to that, we have taken a number of comprehensive measures on licensing and accreditation. We have drafted and submitted to the Duma a revised version of the federal law On Licensing. I'd like to use this opportunity to ask the deputies to expedite its final approval. We have also approved the concept for forming a unified national accreditation system. In this context, we must sharply reduce the scale of the licensing and mandatory certification of goods. Thus, the new federal law On Licensing will decrease the number of licensed activities from 80 to 49 and will revise industrial laws requiring licensing. As we've already said, licenses will have no expiration date and the main emphasis will be shifted to the monitoring of compliance with the license requirements. Starting in 2012, a considerable number of licensing procedures will be transferred into the electronic format. This will save business people from having to make tiresome visits to all kinds of offices.

Now I'd like to say a few words about certification. Quite recently, up to 78% of commodities and services were subject to this procedure. Now it is only 46% and in the near future we must bring it down to 23%. In all other cases the producers will have to declare whether their commodities meet safety and quality requirements. This will substantially increase the responsibility of the producers and the role of self-regulating organisations and liability insurance. I'd like to draw your attention again to self-regulating organisations. They should not go around as they please but should comply with certain regulations. Otherwise we'll have a negative effect instead of a positive one. We have already discussed this as regards construction and some other industries. This is the first point.

And now I'd like to make my second point. I've already asked First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov and you: What's the problem? At a certain point people received some permits and now we are changing the procedures, thereby making this decision retroactive. Now self-regulating organisations are telling the people who used to visit offices and receive all kinds of permits and papers: "No, these are no longer valid, now come back and start the process over again." I'd like you to set things right in this respect, please bear this in mind.

We must launch economic principles, primarily to encourage entrepreneurs to invest into the safety and quality of their goods and services. In turn, self-regulating organisations must become an effective instrument of market control.

The notification procedure for starting new businesses has been in effect for 20 types of businesses since July 1, 2009. More than 70,000 entrepreneurs have already benefited from the new system, mostly entrepreneurs involved in small and medium-sized businesses, retail, catering and the provision of personal services. I believe that we should continue to extend the list of areas to which the notification principles will apply. In fact, we need to help people start and develop their own businesses without administrative barriers and superfluous expenses.

Bringing order to the so-called mass state services that are used by the citizens is extremely important. All procedures must be really accessible, streamlined and as transparent as possible to make people feel real improvements from the implementation of state services, let’s say, in electronic from, from the opening of full service centres operating in the “single window” format in each municipality, each urban district. People must be able to feel the general improvement of the quality of services. Incidentally, I would like to say that the single window mechanism is very simple and clear and it is in high demand. A person comes and solves many of his problems at once – this is very convenient for people.

More than 3.5 million people turned to such centres in 2010, more than 90% of visitors assessed the quality of such full service centres’ work as high. In the near future we must complete the system for providing state and municipal services electronically. I am talking about the unified portal of services, information and utility sites, integrated communication channels, departmental and regional data banks, so that citizens won’t have to carry documents from one office to another. By the way, Mr Shchegolev (Minister of Communications and Mass Media Igor Shchegolev) and I have discussed the task the ministry is facing. This deals with merging all the data bases of different ministries and agencies into one data base. We will not be able to organise work efficiently without it. What progress have you made (addressing Igor Shchegolev)?

Igor Shchegolev: We are actively working on this; we discuss it every day with Mr Volodin at the commission (Vyacheslav Volodin, Deputy Prime Minister and Government Chief of Staff). Most of the departments have been involved in it, the rest are about to conclude agreements with our ministry on incorporating this system. July 1 is our deadline. Under the law on state services, the agencies will be not be allowed to request from citizens the information that is available in various departmental data bases beginning on July 1. And we will of course do our best to approach this stage and continue on to another stage so that such services will be provided to citizens both on the municipal and the regional level.

Vladimir Putin: Please, do keep up with this pace. We need to finish this work.

Igor Shchegolev: We will.

Vladimir Putin: But I would like to say that the citizens who prefer the traditional methods of obtaining public services, directly from the agency, as we say, straight from the source, must have the opportunity to do so.

And of course we should not forget about the development of clear and transparent administrative regulations to provide state and municipal services. The quality of services depends to a large extent on how clearly these regulations are formulated. I would like to remind you that the work on regulating state and municipal services must be finished by July 1, 2012, as Mr Shchegolev just said. You must create the base for this by July 1 of this year, right?

Igor Shchegolev: It will be forbidden to request such data beginning on July 1 of this year. The main system is already working, and now we are dealing with the departmental systems. We have a lot of work to do, but the services that are on our priority list will have to be functioning under the new principles this summer.

Vladimir Putin: Good. Once again I would like to stress that the provision of state services will be charged in accordance with the Tax Code or the List of Paid Services approved by the Russian government. It will be illegal to demand any additional money from businesses and citizens.

And in conclusion, I would like to ask the Ministry of Economic Development to thoroughly analyse law enforcement practices in the field of public administration. We need to look out for any possible obstructions and pay attention to them while finishing off our further plans on reducing the administrative barriers. We need a transparent programme of actions in this sphere for the near future.

I would like to highlight another issue, which is not connected with the aforementioned problem. We will have to approve the staff of the organising committee for preparing and holding the celebrations devoted to the State Hermitage Museum’s 250^th anniversary. In 2014, very soon, we will celebrate this event, which is extremely important for Russia and the whole world. The State Hermitage is one of the most important museums of art and culture in the world. This is, undoubtedly, the heritage of not only Russia but all of humanity.

We must ensure this anniversary is held at the highest level and, first of all, we must aim our efforts at developing and maintaining the State Hermitage, extending opportunities for scientific, museum and restoration work, to forge international relationships. I will ask the organising committee to prepare a specific plan for holding the State Hermitage’s anniversary celebrations in Russia.

And once again I would like to remind you about the executive order. Let’s make it clear today, name its primary parameters. We will assume that it will be approved at this government meeting, so that I can sign the executive order on holding the world championships.

As for the State Hermitage, we need to start this work at once. And prepare a proposal for me, please: Find time in your schedule, we will see Mikhail Piotrovsky.

Let’s get down to work.