Vladimir Putin Addressed Deputies and Senators at the Council of Legislators

Vladimir Putin discussed measures to support the participants in the special operation and the state of intergovernmental relations. The President spoke at the Council of Legislators, which took place on April 28 at the Taurida Palace in St. Petersburg.

Putin thanked the parliamentarians for their work and recalled that this year marks the 30th anniversary of both chambers of the Federal Assembly, which were elected on December 12, 1993. federal, social state,” the president said. According to him, in the parliamentary agenda 2022-2023. the central place was occupied by the issues of ensuring a special military operation, supporting the defense industry, social and legal protection of military personnel and mobilized, as well as the integration of new territories.

“I already said in my message that our task is not to adapt, not to wait out a period of difficulties, challenges and external pressure, but to create a base, a basis for the long-term, independent, successful development of our country. To strengthen its sovereignty in all components: in politics and the economy, science and technology, education and culture, relying primarily on internal resources, natural advantages, and the most powerful creative potential of our multinational people,” the President said. He said that the forecast for the growth of the Russian economy is stable. However, now we need to fine-tune mechanisms to attract investment, ensure balanced territorial development, and financial stability in all regions.

The President also stressed the importance of parliamentary diplomacy: “Russia is not going to go into ‘self-isolation’. On the contrary, we will expand pragmatic, equal, mutually beneficial, exclusively partnership relations with friendly countries in Eurasia, Africa, and Latin America. In the same States, by the way, we have a lot of people who think the same way with us, in Europe.” Therefore, Russia is ready to work with those foreign partners, with global companies and corporations that value their business reputation and want to cooperate with Russia, he added.

Before the President’s speech, State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin and Federation Council Speaker Valentina Matviyenko discussed with parliamentarians and ministers support measures for participants in special operations and interbudgetary relations for the stability of regional development. “A lot depends on us how effectively issues related to the provision of social assistance to participants in the special military operation, their families, the implementation of the president’s message, but also, of course, interbudgetary relations, will be resolved,” Volodin said.

Minister of Health Mikhail Murashko, speaking at a council of legislators, said that specialists are now being trained who will provide psychological assistance to participants in the special operation. “We know perfectly well how difficult it is sometimes to attract participants in hostilities to the offices of medical and psychological assistance. They are shy, they apply for this help late, therefore, bringing the actual help to the outpatient link, this is a cardinal change and a cardinal approach,” he said.

Murashko also added that a working group has now been created together with the Ministry of Defense, the Russian Guard, the FSB, psychologists, which has developed guidelines for post-traumatic syndrome (Vedomosti wrote about its work). Minister of Science Valery Falkov, in turn, noted that courses are now being held to improve the competence of psychological services in universities. He noted that more than 1,800 children of the participants in the special operation entered universities under a quota in 2022.

At the same time, in his speeches, Volodin criticized the Ministry of Education and Science, and Matvienko – the Ministry of Health. Volodin said that now it is necessary to create preferential admission to universities for participants in the special operation, giving them state-funded places in universities: “Can’t we make a decision so that those who protect us enter some of these state-funded places? Can! What is the problem?”

And Matvienko first criticized the situation with the medical and social examination and disability of former participants in the special operation. According to her, many are “wrapped because of the wrong comma.” She also said that one should not promote the participants of the special operation: “When the relatives of our heroes, the families of the victims, instead of real help, are given completely inappropriate gifts: towels, sweets, shampoos, all this is filmed and then reported on social networks, nothing but fair outrage among our citizens [это] does not call.”

Then, responding to a speech by the Minister of Health, she said that legislators do not need “glamorous reports”, but they need to discuss problems: “Let’s be critical of your activities and ours.” The production of prostheses caused criticism. “These villains have lost their conscience and morality. They are starting to impose sanctions on prostheses,” Matvienko said.

The Ministry of Health, according to the senator, should have predicted this a year ago and organized the production of prostheses. “The problem of constant lies at different levels is our constant misfortune. The desire to wishful thinking. It is necessary to finish with this, ”Murashko Matvienko fell upon.

The legislators talked about what measures had already been taken to support the participants in the special operation, and what more should be taken. For example, Marina Dmitrieva, chairman of the Ivanovo Regional Duma, chairman of the commission of the Council of Legislators on social policy issues, said that it was necessary to adopt a standard of support for participants in the special operation and their families so that they would be provided the same regardless of the region. According to her, the commission is now collecting the practice of support measures in the regions in order to analyze them later and develop criteria for improving efficiency.

Viktor Bondarev, chairman of the Federation Council Committee on Defense, said that it is necessary to establish a mechanism for exchanging apartments for participants in a special operation who have received a disability in the legislation. According to him, the current regulatory framework allows for the rehabilitation of such citizens with the provision of technical means of rehabilitation, including a wheelchair for movement, but often such a participant in a special operation lives in a residential area located on the upper floors of the house.

“The room is not equipped with an elevator and other auxiliary equipment. I consider it necessary to fix at the legislative level a mechanism for exchanging a dwelling for a similar one, where a wheelchair user will be able to go out into the street without involving other people,” he said.

The second topic of the Council of Legislators was the state of interbudgetary relations and the development of regions in the new conditions. From the point of view of the budget, one of the key problems is the high differentiation of regions in terms of income and level of socio-economic development, stressed Andrey Makarov, Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Budget and Taxes. Even with an increase in the amount of support for subjects from the federal budget, this gap does not decrease, but increases, he noted. 65% of the total surplus of the regions falls on five regions, Makarov said.

Today, the most important thing for the budgets of the subjects is the stability and predictability of income. At the same time, decisions on regional tax incentives are often made by the federal authorities, and they are binding on local authorities, he recalled. Back in 2017, a decision was made to switch to “second key rules,” Makarov continued. That is, to activate the decision of the federal authorities to provide tax benefits that are credited to the regional budgets, the consent of the subject is needed, he explained.

“In 2018, after this decision was made, the price of benefits for regions and municipalities amounted to 600 billion rubles. Today, the price for them, because there is no second key, is 1.6 trillion rubles. At the same time, our support fund that we give remains 830 billion rubles. It turns out that we support business at the expense of the regions, because in fact we give to the regions half as much as we take from the benefits that we give at the federal level, ”Makarov emphasized.