It turned out why parliamentary meetings with ministers are held “in a closed format”

“Officially no additional security measures are being taken”

State Duma deputies at a plenary meeting discussed with the Minister of Education of the Russian Federation Sergei Kravtsov the situation with the provision of textbooks to schools in the regions. The instruction to invite the relevant minister was given by State Duma Chairman Vyacheslav Volodin, and deputies from the regions asked him about this.

“The minister’s official data during the discussion differed from the information that deputies from the regions received locally,” Oleg Smolin, first deputy chairman of the State Duma Committee on Education and Science, told MK. – Officially, there are practically no problems. According to reports voiced by deputies, there are not enough textbooks in specific schools. Deputies asked Education Minister Sergei Kravtsov a variety of questions, including schoolchildren’s nutrition. But the reason for inviting the head of the educational department to the State Duma was the problem of providing Russian schools with textbooks.

I think the meeting was useful. Already as a result of Kravtsov’s previous speeches in the State Duma, the ministry’s apparatus actively began to solve the problem of purchasing and delivering textbooks to the regions. One of the most difficult problems remains in Dagestan. I can say that schools in Omsk had serious problems with textbooks, but somewhere in mid-September, as the head of the education department told me, they were “staffed.” The minister noted that prices for some textbooks (those controlled at the federal level) have decreased this year. For other textbooks, as deputies reported, prices could have increased. But as I understand it, both sides consider the results of the meeting positive, because the ministry paid attention to the problem and will continue to work on solving it.

In most regions, the need for textbooks corresponds to the number of publications actually purchased this year. In general, the number of textbooks purchased this year is almost 12 million units more than last year, amounting to 66 million. Moreover, if additional questions arise, the head of the Russian Ministry of Education asked to send information to the department. Deputies also raised the topic of electronic textbooks. The Minister of Education of the Russian Federation emphasized that there is no talk of switching to them. Electronic resources are only an addition to the traditional education system.

“One of the key components of the problem is that providing schools with textbooks is mainly a regional problem,” continues State Duma deputy Oleg Smolin. – The regions have deficit budgets, so not all regions equally allocate funds for the purchase of educational literature. But the proposal to transfer school funding to the federal budget, which would certainly lead to cheaper textbooks due to mass circulation, was commented by Kravtsov in this way: “Well, you know that the budget has been approved. And we are always in favor of spending more money on education.” It is clear that this is a problem not only of the Ministry of Education, but also of the state educational system as a whole.

– Why was the meeting of the deputies with Minister Kravtsov held “in a closed format”?

– All such meetings now (with relevant ministers), by decision of the Duma Council, are held in a closed format. No official additional security measures are being taken, but journalists are not invited to them. Our meetings were held in exactly the same way with the First Deputy Minister of Energy and other government representatives, who are now actively invited to the State Duma. In this sense, we must pay tribute to the Chairman of the Duma Volodin – the Russian parliament has become more like foreign parliaments, when on pressing issues, without waiting for government hours, it urgently invites ministers or their deputies.