Prisoners ask to put on – Newspaper Kommersant No. 7 (7452) dated 01/17/2023

As it became known to Kommersant, the Supreme Court of Russia (SC) registered a complaint from a prisoner from the Snezhinka colony in the Khabarovsk Territory about a “shortage” in salary. Andrey Resin, sentenced to life for life, claims that he received less than 9 thousand rubles from the Federal Penitentiary Service for working as a hairdresser in the Far North. Experts point out that despite the modest amount in this private story, the problem of non-payment of the “northern” allowances affects thousands of prisoners. The Presidential Council for Human Rights (HRC) is ready to initiate the bill necessary to solve the problem.

Andrei Resin was sentenced to life in prison for a triple murder in 1999. He is serving his sentence in Snezhinka (IK-6 of the Khabarovsk Territory; one of the seven colonies in the Russian Federation for life-sentenced prisoners). Since November 2021, Mr. Resin has been suing the colony: he insists that for 11 months of work as a hairdresser, he was underpaid 9146 rubles – an allowance for work in the Far North. The salary of Mr. Resin was only 933 rubles, but with additional payments it could increase to 1,746 rubles. The Amur City, Khabarovsk Regional and Ninth Cassation Courts have already denied Andrey Resin’s claim – they referred to the absence of employment contracts between the Federal Penitentiary Service and the prisoners. The courts consider the relationship between working convicts and colonies to be “non-working” – despite the fact that thousands of prisoners are involved in work in the Far North, Olga Podoplelova, a lawyer from the Rus Sitting Foundation (who helps prisoners and their families; is included in the register of foreign agents) explained to Kommersant .

It should be noted that hundreds of cities in 33 regions of the Russian Federation belong to the regions of the Far North and territories and legally equated to them. Such regions have their own northern wage supplements; their percentage in each case is calculated individually, including depending on the fixed salary. In the Khabarovsk Territory, the working settlement of Elban, where Snezhinka is located, also belongs to the northern territories.

In the regions of the Far North and equivalent areas, there are 82 colonies, where as of December 1, 2022, 33,551 prisoners were kept, Kommersant was told in the Federal Penitentiary Service of Russia. Of these, 17,183 people were involved in labor. They are “obliged to work in places and jobs determined by the administration of correctional institutions” and “have the right to wages,” the department explained.

Representatives of the Federal Penitentiary Service, participating in the courts on the suit of Andrei Resin, did not deny that “according to the meaning of the legislation, coefficients and other types of allowances apply to convicts.” However, in their opinion, northern allowances are an “exception” for working convicts. In his complaint to the Supreme Court (available to Kommersant), Andrey Resin calls this discrimination. “We are talking about full-fledged labor relations – with a work schedule, duties and responsibilities, and from the point of view of the principle of the prohibition of discrimination, it should not matter whether a person works in the wild or in captivity,” Ms. Podoplelova agrees. “We believe that there is discrimination based on sign of the status of the person and the place of his labor activity.

Andrei Resin also points out to the Supreme Court that food and hygiene items in the Snezhinki store are more expensive than in the “non-northern” colonies. The complaint even provides a comparative table of prices for products in Snezhinka and IK-1 in the Ryazan region: coffee is more expensive by 200 rubles, tea – by 55 rubles, sugar – by 17 rubles, toilet paper – by 27 rubles, toothpaste pasta – 17 rubles. “The difference is about 12-13%, and the northern allowances and coefficients could just compensate for this difference,” says Olga Podoplelova.

The expert believes that the problem of non-payment of allowances to prisoners “was created by the Supreme Court itself back in 2014.” Then the Presidium of the Supreme Court, in a review of judicial practice, indicated that the relationship between employed prisoners and the Federal Penitentiary Service is not labor. Until 2014, the courts – in particular, in Murmansk and Karelia – took the side of prisoners on the issue of northern payments. But after the appearance of the review of the Armed Forces, this practice ceased.

Andrey Resin’s complaint to the Supreme Court is actually the first attempt in nine years to return to the discussion of the problem. But the Federal Penitentiary Service, in response to a request from Kommersant, said that it agreed with the position of the Presidium of the Armed Forces of 2014. The department believes that since “an employment contract is not concluded with convicts”, then the payment of the district coefficient and the percentage allowance “are not carried out”. Prisoners have already been provided with food, hygiene items and “clothing for the season,” the Federal Penitentiary Service said in a response. It also states that the rules that establish the rights of prisoners to fair remuneration and regulate their work in colonies “correspond to the UN Standard Minimum Rules” and “conform to the European Prison Rules.” They are “aimed at reforming the convicts” and “cannot be regarded as violating the rights” of these convicts.

A member of the HRC, an expert on the protection of the rights of prisoners, Eva Merkacheva, believes that labor payments and allowances “of course, are due to convicts.” She points out that the problem of non-payment of northern allowances concerns not only the colonies, but also correctional centers. This is considered a milder punishment than a colony, and convicts work in civilian enterprises, plants and factories; Now there are 186 such centers in Russia, they are also subordinate to the Federal Penitentiary Service. “It turns out that a message is given to entrepreneurs: take prisoners, they can be underpaid,” Ms. Merkacheva is indignant. In her opinion, this practice “infringes” both convicts who are underpaid, “and free people who cannot get the same job.” The HRC member points out that even a small amount can be extremely important for a prisoner. “Once I was in the Surgut colonies, where in stores sausages cost 999 rubles, and a can of condensed milk was more than 300 rubles,” she recalls. “But prisoners spend money not only on food, but also on paying off claims to victims. And they send these pennies home to the outback, to families. I know a case when three thousand rubles earned in the colony helped the mother of a prisoner to buy firewood for the winter.”

If the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation refuse Andrei Resin, then members of the HRC and government experts will have to review the legislation, Eva Merkacheva believes. She assured Kommersant that she was “ready to come up with such an initiative” as soon as the decision of the Supreme Court becomes known.

Maria Starikova