Monitoring Report of the Activity of the 12th Session of the 9th Verkhovna Rada

Summary

Leading indicators of the work of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine during the 12th session of the 9th convocation:

436 draft laws registered. Of which:

1. 4 (0.9%) European integration draft laws;
2. 12 (3%) draft laws on the consent or denunciation of international treaties;
3. 3 (0.7%) urgent draft laws.

108 draft laws were adopted in their entirety. Of which:

1. 12 (11.1%) European integration draft laws;
2. 14 (13%) laws on ratification of international treaties;
3. 3 (2.8%) laws were identified by the President as urgent.

The President vetoed (and submitted his proposals) draft laws five times

33 laws were adopted in their entirety after the first reading (31%), and 75 laws were adopted after the second reading (69%).

Monitoring of the work of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine during the 12th session of the 9th convocation revealed three key trends: 1) the development of the military agenda and its saturation to the pre-war level; 2) a lower level of legislative activity amid the contradictory dynamics of legislative spam; 3) increased violations of the legislative procedure.

Development of the military agenda and its saturation to the pre-war level

The 9th Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine has been working under martial law for more time (over 3 years) than under normal conditions. In 2022, the Verkhovna Rada suspended almost all the draft laws prepared before the introduction of martial law and focused on adapting legislation to the conditions of martial law and the realities of a full-scale war. Later, in the second half of 2022 and 2023, the Verkhovna Rada partially returned to the draft laws registered before 24 February 2022. However, there were fewer and fewer such draft laws over time, and now the Parliament is increasingly focused on the new agenda. In particular, only five of the 108 laws adopted during the 12th session were registered before 24 February 2022. 

During the six sessions of the martial law parliament, so many draft laws of the martial law agenda were pending that the speed of their consideration reached (and sometimes even exceeded) the level of 2021. Now, the 9th Ukrainian parliament is considering them for the longest time [on average]: an average of 335 days pass from registration to adoption of a draft law in the second reading and in its entirety.

A similar situation has developed with the time spent on consideration of draft laws in the session hall. The format of considering draft laws in the session hall in the 10th, 11th, and 12th sessions is increasingly reminiscent of the times before the full-scale invasion: there are more discussions, and they are longer. The likely reasons for this are:

1. a decrease in the number of draft laws with consensus support;
2. a gradual easing of existing information restrictions on the coverage of the Parliament’s work, which encourages MPs to speak more;
3. a gradual increase in the perceived level of security in the Parliament building.

Lower level of legislative activity against the background of contradictory dynamics of legislative spam

The 12th session of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine showed a relatively low number of registered draft laws (436). It means that each MP registered just over 1 draft law on average. The lower level of legislative activity is not a bad thing: it is better to register and pass a few high-quality laws than to waste energy on hundreds of empty and unpromising initiatives. Let’s hope that parliamentarians are moving in this direction. There are even some reasons for this. High-quality draft laws are usually the result of the collective work of MPs, not individual lawmaking. During the 12th session, the share of draft laws with 8–22 signatories increased, equalling the share with one initiator. 

Not everything looks good, as there are signs that the practice of legislative spamming, which involves registering many unpromising draft laws, is still prevalent. The legislative activity of MPs from the Restoration of Ukraine group has several signs of legislative spam: (1) on average, one MP of this group registered almost five draft laws in the 12th session, while the figures of MPs of other factions and groups do not even reach the level of 1 draft law per 1 MP; (2) the share of draft laws registered by MPs of this group reaches 20.4% of all registered draft laws, which is higher than the share of government draft laws (15.8%), despite this (3) not a single draft law initiated by MPs of the Restoration of Ukraine group was adopted during the 12th session.

Increased number of violations of the legislative procedure

The level of violations of the legislative procedure increased during the 12th session. Two-thirds (66%) of the laws had violations of the procedures established by the Rules of Procedure during the 12th session. An increase in violations occurred in the second reading, which has not been observed since the 8th session.

The number of violations of the Constitution of Ukraine during the 12th session remained high. 44% of draft laws adopted during the 12th session were signed by the President of Ukraine with a violation of the 15-day deadline or were not signed at all. Perhaps the only positive thing is that the number of constitutional violations did not increase compared to the 11th session. Since 2022, the percentage of draft laws that violated the 15-day signing deadline has been steadily increasing. The 12th session broke this trend, stabilising the figure at 44%. 

Route through the monitoring report*

This monitoring report of the activity of the 12th session of the 9th Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine consists of a summary, five units and annexes. *To get acquainted with each unit, please follow the links below:

1. lawmaking activity: the total number of registered draft laws and laws, their breakdown by initiators and groups of signatories;
2. passage of draft laws: breakdown of laws by readings of adoption, deadlines for submitting opinions of the main committees, timeframe from registration to adoption of the law, including by readings and initiators;
3. plenary time: total time spent on consideration of draft laws in the VRU, distribution of time for consideration of draft laws according to the initiator, and the time required for consideration of the draft law in the session hall;
4. committees: total number and breakdown by initiators of opinions on dismissal, number of committee meetings and their workload in accordance with the number of registered draft laws and submitted opinions on draft laws, including the workload per committee member and secretariat staff member;
5. violations of the Rules of Procedure: the number of violations of the Rules of Procedure in relation to draft laws and proposals of the President of Ukraine.

Annexes contain lists of five draft laws included in the ranking, which is based on various quantitative indicators (e.g., days from registration to adoption).