Mass appeals of citizens on one issue will receive one answer

The State Duma approved a new procedure for considering citizens’ appeals, informs on Monday, the newspaper “Kommersant” with reference to the relevant document.

According to the publication, the document was signed by Chairman of the State Duma Vyacheslav Volodin. It regulates the organization of the personal reception of citizens and the consideration of their individual and collective appeals received in writing or orally, as well as electronically.

In particular, the concept of “mass appeals” is being introduced: now written requests on the same topic from different citizens or their associations will be registered under one number and sent to committees or commissions that will prepare a draft response for sending to citizens and posting on the website of the State Duma.

Until now, deputies and their apparatus have had difficulties when carbon-copied appeals had to be registered each separately, and, as the source of the newspaper in the State Duma says, sometimes there were a lot of them, for example, on regulating the use of QR codes during a pandemic COVID-19.

Now the rules stipulate that citizens’ appeals are considered within 30 days, but deputies or employees of the apparatus will be able to extend the consideration period for another 30 days. The duration of the reception of one citizen cannot be more than 30 minutes. At the same time, a deputy has the right to refuse a citizen a personal reception if he is not a voter from his region.

In addition, deputies and civil servants can determine the next appeal to be groundless and stop correspondence with a citizen or organization on it if the letter is devoted to a question to which they have repeatedly given substantive answers, and at the same time, there are no new arguments or circumstances in the appeal. Appeals addressed to “all deputies of the State Duma”, without indicating their names, “may be transferred to factions.”

If the letter contains obscene or offensive language, threats to the life, health and property of deputies, the Duma Department for Work with Citizens’ Appeals may leave it unanswered on the merits.