The full-scale invasion changed the lives of all of us, and we all experienced the shock of February 24. It was difficult to imagine how the Parliament would continue to function when work in the VRU was directly related to the threat to life for everyone, including MPs. However, the constitutional majority of MPs continued to work, and the Verkhovna Rada continued to function. Regardless of the decisions made, the fact that Parliament continued to operate during full-scale war is an achievement. However, we discovered some other features of the first half of the parliamentary work in wartime conditions.

In particular, even during martial law, there was a tendency to decrease the number of registered draft laws, which indicates a decrease in legislative spam. But what sets this session apart is the amount of legislation passed.

The Verkhovna Rada adopted 229 laws during the 7th session, a record for all convocations. The obvious reason for this is the need for urgent adaptation of legislation to the realities of a full-scale war, and it speaks of a relative consensus regarding the adopted laws. Also, during half a year of war, the President transferred the legislative role in forming internal policy to the Government and MPs while he submitted the ratifications or approval of decrees.

During this session, we saw an actual “turbo mode” because, in addition to a record number of adopted laws, we observed a significant decrease in the time for processing and passing draft laws.

Three factors can explain this:

• political consensus (especially on issues of defence and security, immediate response to the realities of full-scale war);
• security threat during meetings;
• no online broadcasts.

In this way, a full-scale invasion interrupted the trend of increasing the time draft laws pass from registration to adoption at all stages of this passage. The invasion seemed to reset a large part of the agenda. The main concern of the MPs was adaptation to new realities.

It is also interesting that for the first time during the 9th convocation of this session, a draft law was registered, for which the Committee on Freedom of Speech is the main committee.

But there is also a negative side – the share of violations has increased. Procedures for consideration of 2/3 of all laws had violations. Of course, the increase in the number of violations can be justified by a full-scale war, the need for urgent legislation adaptation and the parliament’s extraordinary working conditions. Despite the turbo regime and a large share of violations, these violations are still less than during the first two sessions of their convocation.

Read more about the work of the Verkhovna Rada during the full-scale war in our monitoring.

Agency for Legislative Initiatives for “Dzerkalo Tyzhnia” (Mirror Weekly).

Since the morning of 24 February and until now, the Verkhovna Rada — Ukraine’s only legislative body — has continually been exercising its powers in Kyiv, despite the high threat of physical destruction. The constitutional majority of MPs are in Ukraine. Laws are passed. The state is functioning.

Fortunately, it is the first time that the Ukrainian Parliament is going through the unique experience of functioning in a full-scale war. How exactly does the Verkhovna Rada operate with martial law and the real threat of missile strikes being in place? The Agency for Legislative Initiatives analysed the work of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine during six months of the war — from 24 February to 6 September (this is part of the seventh session that was taking place when martial law was in effect). Presented below are our brief findings.

Speed, consensus, and efficiency are the three words that can be used to characterise the operation of the Parliament during the war. On the one hand.

During the six months of the war, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine accomplished a lot of work indeed. It did so much as to set a record in terms of the number of laws passed in one session. From the beginning of the full-scale invasion until 6 September, 229 laws were passed. This is more than in any other session of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine across all convocations (for which data is available).

Why so many, and what are those laws? The lion’s share goes for the laws that govern life in a country during wartime.

The invasion brought to nought a large part of the prior agenda. Since 24 February, a need has emerged to urgently adjust the legislation to the realities of the full-scale war. Relevant laws were developed and passed almost from scratch, and very rapidly.

National security, reallocation of funds, law enforcement and support of the economy became the priority needs and areas of work of the Verkhovna Rada.

During half a year of the full-scale war, the President in fact transferred the law-making role within development internal policies to the Government and MPs. The draft laws submitted by the President during this period were exclusively ratifications, presidential decrees and symbolic law drafts related to the issues of foreign policy, security and defence (which, by the way, clearly corresponds to the distribution of powers under the Constitution).

Half a year of the war can also be called a real “turbo mode”. In addition to the record-setting numbers of passed laws, we see a significant decrease in the time spent on processing and clearing draft laws across all indicators. Parliamentary committees, expert and analytical departments of the Parliament mobilised resources and quickly issued opinions. The processes of political approval of draft laws were also significantly accelerated, and a long-term consensus was in place among MPs in the session hall. Everyone worked in harmony, to the extent possible, and made efficient use of available time and other resources.

Interesting data about plenary time is in our possession: half of the draft laws passed in the first reading were considered for less than 41 seconds; 90% of the draft laws in the first reading were considered by MPs for less than two minutes; half of all the draft laws that were passed in both readings during half a year of the war were considered by lawmakers in the session hall for less than six minutes.

Just to compare: In the last pre-war, sixth session of the Verkhovna Rada, these time indicators were many times higher: half of the draft laws passed in the first reading were considered for up to 15 minutes in the hall; up to 26 minutes of plenary time was taken up by consideration of half of the draft laws that went through both readings during the sixth session.

In fact, for half a year of the full-scale war, what MPs in the Parliamentary Hall did was only press voting buttons – with no scandals, long speeches from the lectern and fights, as it used to be before. This “phenomenal occurrence” can be explained by the following three factors:

1. Political consensus was in place — especially so on the issues of defence and security — as well as the need to immediately respond to the realities of a full-scale war;
2. Threat to the security of MPs during the sittings of the Verkhovna Rada — Russia has repeatedly “promised” strikes on “centres of decision-making”;
3. No online broadcasting for sittings, and thus no need to deliver lengthy speeches targeting voters.

But work efficiency does not equal quality. The new realities of the war and the “turbo mode” resurrected old “bugs” in the law-making system and created new ones.

When lots of laws are passed quickly, the quality of the decisions themselves will suffer, and a certain part of the procedures will be ignored.

A draft law is a crucial document, which, when approved, will determine how the state and citizens shall function in a given area. Before the draft law gets to the session hall, it must be processed at least by the committees and expert departments of the Verkhovna Rada. MPs should familiarise themselves with the text of the draft law and supporting documents. All these procedures are required to ensure at least some quality control of what the lawmakers press the voting buttons for in the session hall, and to shield against hasty and poor (populist, undemocratic or ill-considered) decision-making.

However, with the war being in place, very little time passed from the emergence of an idea to the adoption of laws. Over the six months of the full-scale war, lots of draft laws appeared that were adopted “on the fly”: five draft laws were adopted on the day of registration; 12 more — the following day after registration. Most draft laws (59%) became laws after the first reading.

That said, an opposite trend was in place during the previous two sessions, as two-thirds of the laws were adopted in the second reading. In practice, two readings make it possible to prepare the draft law better, to address shortcomings and errors discovered in the first reading. However, two readings also require more time, which was obviously not available in view of the invasion. Can we be confident that they are all well written and analysed, or at least read? No. Do we know how these decisions will affect the country in the future, especially after the end of the war? This cannot be assessed at this time.

The need to adjust the law-making process to the conditions of martial law created another unusual parliamentary practice, i.e., “matryoshka laws”. These are several laws with different subject matters of regulation, and contents are disguised under one title. Usually, such laws have one content and targeting at the stage of the first reading. Yet then amendments are introduced to them, and in fact, they are supplemented with brand-new provisions that were not only beyond consideration in the first reading but also belong to a different area of regulation.

For example, the Law on Amending Certain Laws of Ukraine regarding the Functioning of the Civil Service and Local Self-Government During the Effectiveness of Martial Law. Its first reading version dealt with the distribution of powers between local self-government bodies and military administrations. Yet at the stage of amendments for the second reading, provisions were added to expand the powers of the Verkhovna Rada and the President. Among other things, based on these new norms, the Verkhovna Rada’s Ombudsperson, Lyudmila Denisova, was dismissed. The new provisions added for the second reading not only related to a completely different topic, but also violated the Constitution, as they expanded the powers of the Verkhovna Rada and the President.

A reminder is that new powers of the Verkhovna Rada and the President may come into being only through amendments to the Constitution, which is prohibited under martial law. Yet the Ukrainian lawmakers ignored the said norm, and this is no singular case during half a year of the war.

Another factual violation of the Constitution is the President’s failure to sign the adopted law drafts within the prescribed 15-day period. This practice existed also before the full-scale invasion, and not only under President Zelenskyi. However, it is particularly visible now — for example, by the beginning of September, more than two dozen draft laws neither signed nor vetoed by the President had accumulated. They have been in limbo for months and do not come into effect. There are no obvious reasons for this phenomenon.

They include:

1. The draft Law on Amending Article 3 of the Law on Some Issues of Indebtedness of Defence-Industrial Complex Enterprises that Are Members of the State Concern ‘Ukroboronprom’ and Ensuring Their Stable Development.
2. The draft Law on Amending Article 23 of the Law on Mobilisation Training and Mobilisation regarding the postponement of military service conscription of scientific, scientific-pedagogical, and pedagogical staff during the mobilisation.
3. The draft Law on Amending Certain Legislative Acts of Ukraine to Improve the Fundamentals of Organisation and Conduct of the Resistance Movement.
4. The draft Law on Amending the Law on the Basic Principles of Expropriation of Objects of Property Rights of the Russian Federation and Its Residents in Ukraine regarding the itemisation of certain provisions.
5. The draft Law on Amending Certain Laws of Ukraine to Improve the Selection and Training of Prosecutors.

Along with violations of the Constitution, other deviations from the rules do not seem to be so significant, although there were lots of them too. During half a year of the war, up to 67% of the laws (that is, two-thirds) were adopted with violations of the consideration procedures. For the most part, those were violations of deadlines and the lack of required opinions on the draft laws from the Verkhovna Rada’s expert and analytical departments.

In summary, the full-scale invasion did raise many pressing issues, so a significant number of procedural violations are justified, given the situation at hand. Yet this is no adequate practice in the long run.

Currently, an urgent need arises to hammer out special procedures that would enable the legitimate and fast processing and passing of draft laws in conditions of war or other extraordinary circumstances requiring rapid and, at the same time, legal decisions. A clear algorithm of actions is required to ensure the adequate operation of the system, so that the functioning of the Parliament and the entire state in war conditions be not a miracle in which few people believed, but a regularity in the eyes of citizens, international partners and the enemy.

After the abolition of martial law, the Verkhovna Rada and the Cabinet of Ministers, with the involvement of civil society experts, will need to take a stock of the hastily adopted laws in order to eliminate any possible negative aftermaths for the period of peaceful life.

The Agency for Legislative Initiatives has been promoting the implementation and monitoring the parliamentary reform for many years. According to our latest monitoring data for 2021, the reform of the Ukrainian Parliament has been completed by 45.7%. In recent years, the rate of implementation of the reform has decreased, but the political leadership of the Verkhovna Rada recognizes the need to fulfil the commitments made regarding the implementation of the parliamentary reform. In addition, judging by the public statements of the political leadership of the Parliament, the authorities are fully aware of the actual state of implementation of the reform and the problems in its implementation. And the very fact of a realistic assessment of the situation gives hope for the solution of these problems and the successful completion of the reform.

Today, the Agency is included in the working subgroup on parliamentary reforms in Ukraine and has the opportunity to actively and constructively cooperate directly with representatives of the Verkhovna Rada in this direction.

What are the current priorities in the implementation of the reform of the Parliament? What should be emphasized to change the situation for the better? Oleksandr Zaslavskyi, Director of the Analytical Direction of the Agency, during the forum “Democratic reforms for the integration of Ukraine into the EU: a dialogue with leading reformers”, voiced for our European partners and Ukrainian colleagues from civil society and the Parliament 3 priorities of parliamentary reform in Ukraine.

A well-known problem that complicates the work of the Verkhovna Rada is the production of a large number of legislative initiatives. And this affects the quality of legislative initiatives, as well as the workload of MPs and structural divisions of the Apparatus of the Verkhovna Rada. At the IX convocation of the VRU, there is a steady decrease in the number of, first of all, legislative initiatives by MPs, which is certainly a positive trend. However, it is possible to reduce the amount of “legislative spam” in other ways. In particular, by increasing the requirements for expert-analytical support, generally by increasing the quantity and quality of accompanying analytics in the legislative process. There are global examples when such a step, in particular, increasing the requirements for the preparation of impact assessments of draft acts, reduced the number of these same drafts by many times. This indicates an increase in their quality, as the share of draft laws that change existing laws is radically decreasing.

This also includes strengthening European integration expertise at the parliament level. In particular, by strengthening the capacity of the Committee on Ukraine’s Integration into the European Union. The Verkhovna Rada has three committees whose conclusions are binding on all draft laws: budget, anti-corruption, and European integration. During the convocation, thousands of draft laws pass through these committees. Accordingly, increasing the requirements for accompanying documents, particularly for draft laws related to European integration, and increasing the ability of the Committee on Ukraine’s Integration into the European Union to develop a large number of draft laws will improve the entire European integration direction of legislation. And this, as we understand it, is currently becoming extremely important and relevant.

The war actualized the issue of democratic control in the sphere of security and defence. Changes to the legislation in this direction have already been adopted in Ukraine, which will come into force next year. In particular, a special control committee unique to the Verkhovna Rada will be created, which will carry out control in the field of security and defence.

In terms of parliamentary control, it is worth giving an example of how the Verkhovna Rada adapted to the conditions of war. Since February 24, we have not had the time of questions to the Government, but a special format was introduced when individual ministers met with the heads of parliamentary factions or with representatives of the majority in the Parliament. Some ministers managed to go through this format several times. As for specific actions to strengthen parliamentary control, we must talk about strengthening the system and the regularity of its implementation. Including at the level of committees.

This is also a crucial aspect of the reform. Since the Apparatus is, in fact, a parliamentary service. Although we currently do not have a separate parliamentary public service, the Apparatus of the VRU is the structure that ensures the stability and institutional memory of the Verkhovna Rada. These are people who ensure the work of the parliament even during the war. Among the Apparatus employees, a significant number of those have been working there for more than 15 years. These are high-class specialists. Their experience should be preserved and multiplied, and the status of a parliamentary employee should be strengthened. For this purpose, the draft law on parliamentary service was developed and adopted in the first reading. It would be excellent to adopt it as a whole. The strategy for building the staff potential of the Apparatus of the Verkhovna Rada was also adopted and is already at the final stage of implementation. It should be updated with an emphasis on maintaining the Apparatus employees’ high level of professionalism and preserving institutional memory.

The Agency for Legislative Initiatives will, as far as it can, support these and other areas of parliamentary reform. And we once again emphasize the importance of the stable functioning of such an institution as the Parliament for the implementation of all other reforms and for Ukraine’s progress on the European integration path.

This publication was prepared with the financial support of Sweden.

Parliamentary reform was initiated in 2016 with the Roadmap for Internal Reform and Increasing the Institutional Capacity of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. This reform is still incomplete and has been implemented in less than half. Therefore, we can welcome the statements of the leadership of the Verkhovna Rada regarding the need to implement this reform by at least 70-80%. But to what extent has the reform been implemented so far?

Our methodology estimates its implementation at 45.7% (95 points out of a possible 208) as of July 2021System monitoring has not been carried out since that time. However, superficial monitoring shows a lack of noticeable progress in reform implementation. On some points, regression is observed, for example, at the end of the 6th session, the Verkhovna Rada once again postponed the transition to electronic document management.. Compared to March 2019, progress has advanced by only 4%. Following the Ukrainian tradition, this can be called “stomping in place”. Therefore, the recommendations given in 2019 are still relevant today:

1. Formation of a single coordination centre for parliamentary reform.
2. Implementation of systematic work on implementing recommendations: updating the Roadmap and the priority action plan for its implementation.
3. Approval of the Concept of ‘End-to-End’ Legislative Process (agreed with all subjects of the legislative initiative), which would show the target system of development and decision-making, would determine the critical stages of the implementation of the reform and would outline the effective ways of implementing individual components of the reform to ensure the coherence of efforts of all subjects of the legislative initiative.
4. Ensuring effective communication regarding parliamentary reform within parliamentary factions and groups and between dialogue platforms.
5. Establishing communication with the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine for better coordination of reformation processes in the parliament and the government.
6. Bringing the Regulations of the Verkhovna Rada into compliance with the Constitution of Ukraine.
7. Adoption of the Law “On Parliamentary Service” as a whole.
8. Adoption of the Code of Conduct.

The main problem is the lack of systematicity in reforming the Verkhovna Rada. This especially applies to the MPs themselves. If the reforms that concerned the Apparatus of the VRU and depended on the decision of the leadership of the Apparatus (as well as on the political leadership of the VRU) were advanced more or less comprehensively and considering the recommendations of the Road Map, then the directions that relate to the rules and formats of the work of the MPs themselves have either deteriorated comparing with 2019 or remained approximately at the same level. And where improvements did occur, they were more a response to current challenges and not overly based on the recommendations of the Road Map.

The main improvements regarding the state of implementation of the Road Map recommendations concerned the VRU’s Apparatus. It can be noted here:

1. Approval of the Personnel Potential Development Strategy;
2. Introduction of electronic document management (although still in parallel with paper management);
3. Audit of activities carried out by the Accounting Chamber;
4. Communication strategy implementation activities;
5. Adoption of the draft law “On Parliamentary Service” in the first reading.

Some positive changes were also related to the work of parliamentarians: amendments to the Regulations of the Verkhovna Rada and implementation of the practice of preparing the Plan of legislative works, publication of parliamentary requests, reduction of the number of committees (although there are problems with their areas of responsibility), attempts to improve the control function.

It is worth remembering that our methodology considers the process of implementation of recommendations, so the reform is estimated by as much as 45.7%.

There are only five fully implemented recommendations (that is, less than 10% of the 52 recommendations), and all of them concern the Apparatus of the Verkhovna Rada. These are the recommendations:

• 23 (Implementation of Information and Communication Technologies strategy);
• 26 (the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine must develop and approve a “digital” strategy);
• 35 (audit by the Accounting Chamber);
• 39 (Implementation in the VRU of the personnel potential development strategy);
• 40 (Short-term internship should be separated from the internship of public servants due to employment conditions).

The resource for increasing the assessment of the implementation of the Road Map recommendations, with the assistance of the spheres relevant to the Apparatus of the VRU, has been primarily exhausted (since most of the recommendations have been implemented or almost implemented). Therefore, to increase the share of implemented recommendations at the next evaluation, it will be necessary to implement other Road Map recommendations. In particular, the blocks “Legislative capacity and law-making process”, “Coalition, opposition and dialogue”, and “Adherence to ethical norms and standards of conduct” have a significant potential for implementation because less than a third of the recommendations in them have been implemented.

First of all, it is necessary to implement the main recommendations that concern the main function of the Verkhovna Rada – the law-making process. Of course, it is easier to implement the recommendations that concern the form of work of the Verkhovna Rada, such as electronic, instead of paper, form of document circulation.

Every time MP gets into the scandal, it reduces public trust not only to a particular MP but to Parliament in general. Unfortunately, such scandals occur every month, sometimes every week.

It is not surprising that recent polls show public distrust of Parliament in more than 75%.

Last week, August 23, MP from the “Servant of the People,” deputy chairman of the Budget Committee, Olexander Truhin, got in an accident at Boryspil highway. As a result of the accident, six people were injured. Trukhin, according to media reports, was in a state of intoxication.

However, the most interesting part started after the accident.

Mentions of Trukhin’s involvement in this accident began to disappear from the media sites that wrote about it. However, none of these media refuted the information or additions – the news simply disappeared. Some media outlets reported that they got a request from some alleged PR agency to remove articles.

The “Servant of the People” still not commented on the incident.

As a result, we have a situation where the MP of Ukraine tries to avoid responsibility and disseminate information about the accident with his participation, and the party, in turn, conceals it as it is impossible to call it otherwise in such a situation.

Last month, on July 8, an accident involving a member of parliament took place in the center of Lviv. This time the “main actor” was a non-party MP Oleksandr Yurchenko. After the accident, he tried to flee the scene, inflict damage on the injured driver, and that`s all under the influence of drugs, which was confirmed by the test.

The worst thing in this situation is that the Parliament does not have a mechanism for punishing members of parliament in such cases. Therefore, the Verkhovna Rada Regulatory Committee stated that it could not punish Yurchenko. This again indicates the need to introduce a code of conduct for MPs.

Of course, the problem is not only the lack of the Code of Conduct for parliamentarians but also the problem of a broken justice system. Members of parliament sometimes seem to be outside the legal field, ignoring any rules and regulations and not being responsible for it. After all, there is no clear mechanism for influencing deputies who violate the law.

The law is the same for everyone, but MPs have a special procedure for bringing justice. Only NABU or the central office of the State Bureau of Investigation can conduct investigations of members of parliament, and only the Prosecutor General can carry out amendments to the Unified register of pre-trial investigations. Only after investigations, the trial, and, indeed, the judgment, authorities of the MP could be terminated.

Public attention to the problems of reforming law enforcement and prevent MPs privilege in matters of justice – its first steps.

However, the introduction of the Code of Conduct may also provide mechanisms for the prevention and resolution of problems when MP`s uses their power for selfish purposes, their behavior does not meet professional requirements, and so on. It is important to note that the Code should be the set of rules that members of parliament will use in their daily activities. That is, it should regulate relations in both legislative and parliamentary activities, as well as non-parliamentary activities related to the performance of the functions of the MP.

The scandals in which parliamentarians get involved are most often relate to their extra-parliamentary activities. For the Code to be effective, every parliamentarian must feel responsible for activities that run counter to his or her professional requirements and understand the legitimacy of the Code.

The development of professional and ethical standards for deputies has many advantages:

First, accountability is improved, and trust is strengthened. Society will understand the system of regulating ethics, and it will be easier for it to trust parliamentarians because it will know that any violations will be detected, and violators will be punished. In turn, parliamentarians will feel responsible, as the Code will provide for sanctions, possibly even in the form of termination of office.

Second, the Code can be a means of combating corruption. The established standards will help prevent abuse of office and other forms of corruption, as they establish clear rules of conduct for parliamentarians, mechanisms for monitoring their work, and provide for penalties for violations. These standards will help MPs better understand what society expects of them, especially after certain scandals that may potentially arise.

Third, the Code can be a tool for policy professionalization. Often the behavior of members of the Parliament of Ukraine in the workplace does not meet ethical and moral norms (for example, verbally insulting another MP, fights, sexist behavior, etc.). Unethical behavior in the Parliament undermines the professionalism in the public’s eyes, not only of an individual member but of the Parliament as a whole. Once in parliament, MPs must follow the same rules of conduct in the workplace. Unified standards will also help unite members of parliament themselves and resolve certain political differences constructively.

Thus, developing a Code of Conduct for MPs remains open and it is especially relevant in scandalous situations when members of parliament abuse their professional position. Ukrainian legislation contains many norms concerning MPs ethics, sanctions in case of committing offenses, however, on the one hand, they are unregulated, and on the other hand – there are no principles of conduct of MPs outside the parliament. Therefore, the Code of Conduct could become the basis that would form the internal social responsibility of members of parliament, unify ethical standards and guidelines for all parliamentarians, and as a result – strengthen citizens’ trust in the parliamentary corps.

As promised, the Agency for Legislative Initiatives and the Parliamentary Centre (Canada) has launched activities to provide practical support for the development of knowledge and skills of MPs and staff of secretariats of Verkhovna Rada Committees on how to better structure and manage committees and develop formalized procedures. These activities are carried out within the framework of the project “Parliamentary Accountability for the Security Sector in Ukraine” (PASS Ukraine).

An online meeting was recently held between the staff of the Secretariat of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Law Enforcement and representatives of the House of Commons of Canada, where they exchanged knowledge, experience, and practices on building and managing the work of secretariats.

The meeting was attended by: Head of the Secretariat of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Law Enforcement Bohdan Drapyatyi and his deputies from the Ukrainian side and former Clerks of the House of Commons – from the Canadian side.

This meeting was the first in a series of dialogues between colleagues from the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine and the Parliament of Canada, aimed at the practical support of Verkhovna Rada committees to improve the management of their work.

During the meeting, the secretariat learned about the organizational structure and administrative support of the House of Commons – the types of committee staff and their roles, their interaction with the committee head and other staff, and the career rotation system.

Representatives of the Ukrainian and Canadian parliaments discussed the connection between the work and experience of the staff of the secretariats of the committees in the Verkhovna Rada and the House of Commons and exchanged views on the challenges and ways to address them.

The Parliamentary Accountability for the Security Sector in Ukraine (PASS Ukraine) project is a joint project of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives and the Parliamentary Center (Canada), supported by the Canadian Ministry of International Affairs under the Peacebuilding and Stabilization Program (PSOPs) and in partnership with the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine.

The security and defense sector is certainly one of the most important, especially in a country that has been at war for eight years. Therefore, the Agency for Legislative Initiatives is trying its best to familiarize parliamentarians and staff of the secretariats of the Verkhovna Rada Committees with new tools and methods for reforming the sector.

Last week, as part of the Parliamentary Accountability of the Security Sector in Ukraine (PASS Ukraine) project, the Agency for Legislative Initiatives, in partnership with the Parliamentary Center (Canada), held a training seminar on “Legislative and Regulatory Impact Assessment and its Application in the Security Sector Reform Legislation and defense”.

Members of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Law Enforcement, the Verkhovna Rada Committee on National Security, Defense and Intelligence, and the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Ukraine’s Integration into the European Union were invited to participate in the seminar. Staff from the secretariats of the above-mentioned committees were also invited.

The purpose of the training seminar was to familiarize MPs, committee members, and their staff with Canadian and international experience in assessing legislative and regulatory impact and its application in the legislative process of security and defense sector reform, including assessing the different effects of legislation on women and men.

Nicola Kim, First Secretary, Embassy of Canada in Ukraine, made a welcoming speech at the opening of the training seminar.

The speakers of the training seminar were Canadian experts with many years of experience in regulatory and legislative influence:

• Daniel Trnka, Deputy Head, Regulatory Policy Division, Public Governance Directorate, Organisation for Economic Co-Operation and Development (OECD);
• Rick Stewart, Executive Director of the Regulatory Governance Initiative (RGI) and Co-Director of the Career Development for Regulatory Professionals (CDRP) Program in the School of Public Policy and Administration at Carleton University, Ottawa;
• Michael Presley, Director, Certificate Program in Regulatory Leadership, Centre for Public Management and Policy, University of Ottawa; Former Assistant Deputy Minister (Regulatory Affairs) at the Treasury Board Secretariat, Canada.
• About the experience and practice of Ukraine in applying legislative and regulatory impact assessment in the legislative process, participants were told by Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, MP, Chairwoman, Verkhovna Rada Committee on Ukraine’s Integration into the European Union, Member of the Interparliamentary Relations Group with Canada.

The seminar was held in an unusual format – combining offline and online, which allowed to simultaneously engage Canadian partners who shared their experiences and establish communication between members of different committees.

As part of the project, we plan to hold more such meetings in order to continue involving MPs and Canadian partners in close cooperation in various formats.

The Parliamentary Accountability of the Security Sector in Ukraine (PASS Ukraine) project is a joint project of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives and the Parliamentary Center (Canada), supported by the Canadian Ministry of International Affairs under the Peacebuilding and Stabilization Program (PSOPs) and in partnership with the Verkhovna Rada Of Ukraine.

March 8 is not a holiday of beauty and flowers. This is a day reminiscent of women’s long struggle for their rights. The Constitution of Ukraine guarantees all citizens equal constitutional rights and freedoms and equality before the law. However, gender equality is still a formal concept, enshrined in documents but not enforced in real life.

Especially gender balance is still lacking in the security and defense sector, where women are rarely able to hold leadership positions and don’t have the trust and respect of male colleagues.

The Agency for Legislative Initiatives is implementing the Parliamentary Accountability for the Security Sector in Ukraine project in partnership with the Canadian Parliamentary Centre, the Canadian Ministry of International Affairs, and the Peace and Stabilization Operations Program (PSOPs). One of the project’s essential components is researching the gender aspect in the security and defense sector.

We decided to delve deeper into the topic before International Women’s Day and ask parliamentarians, women in the armed forces volunteers about the problems of gender equality in the security and defense sector and how they can be solved.

The views expressed in this publication reflect the personal beliefs of the speakers and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives.

The Prosecutor General’s Office of Ukraine handed over the first notice of suspicion to the member of parliament for “button pushing”. This is the first attempt in Ukraine history to bring an MP to justice for impersonal voting.

Moreover, bringing a parliamentarian to justice may lead to the termination of his powers. According to Article 81 of the Constitution of Ukraine, a Member of Parliament’s powers are terminated prematurely, particularly in the case of “coming into force of a conviction against him”.  That is, now, in the story with the first notice of suspicion of “button pusher”, the court is to decide.

Besides, MPs have “button pushed” long before the first notice of suspicion from the Prosecutor General and can do it further. After all, their guilt still needs to be proved in court. And this is a rather long process. Besides, evidence is needed. And the recent story with videos that recorded “button-pusher” during the vote for Minister of Science and Education appointment proves – the evidence may “disappear”.

It is necessary to have a “Plan A” – a mechanism that will make impersonal voting impossible for MPs. At the beginning of 2021, the Verkhovna Rada began active talks on overcoming “button pushing”. Verkhovna Rada Speaker Dmytro Razumkov announced some changes that could help eradicate impersonal voting. In particular:

1. Vacant seats reserved for MPs from the temporarily occupied territories will be disconnected from the Rada system;
2. All cards of MPs will be tied to a specific place;
3. Additional video cameras will be installed in the hall to record the voting;
4. The possibility of changing the Rules of Procedure is considered so that the “button pushers” could be suspended for several weeks;
5. It is planned to transfer the parliament to the Rada-4 system, but funds are needed for this.

Will these innovations help prevent “button pushing”? And is there another, easier way?

In the Agency for Legislative Initiatives, we talked about this with the head of the NGO “Electronic Democracy”, ex-adviser to the Chief of the Apparatus of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, and the USPS Alumnus Volodymyr Flonts. During the VIII convocation of the Verkhovna Rada, the expert, and his team spent six months researching the problem of “button pushing” and testing possible solutions. We will talk about one of these options, which also has its drawbacks, but it can work already – without additional funds and time.

“Button pushing” is not so much a matter of impersonal voting. Because in the Verkhovna Rada, an MP always votes for himself for the first time, no matter where he/she sits, no matter what card he/she votes with. The problem is repeated voting when the MP has time to press as many buttons as possible in 10 seconds while voting goes. It is from this that we must proceed.

Volodymyr Flonts says that it doesn’t matter where an MP voted from, if he did it once. Therefore, all allegations about cards are a shift of focus to another topic and not a solution to one-time or multiple voting. The issue of “button pushing” is exclusively about “once or many”. Not “by what card”, “from what place”, “in what way”, “under the cameras or not”.

Volodymyr Flonts says: “The proposed changes are cosmetic. They do not solve the problem but only create restrictions for MPs. Before, if the MP’s desk is temporarily out of order, the button is stuck, the MP could insert his card into the next desk and vote. The rights of MPs did not decrease”.

Now, if you attach each MP to a particular console, then there is a restriction of parliamentarians’ rights. MP, for example, will be able to apply to challenge the results of a vote because his button did not work, and he could not vote. Then there is a possibility that the results of the voting will be questioned.

The decision to disconnect some seats from the system and allow MPs to vote exclusively from their seats may prove ineffective. Instead, much more potential harm than good can be expected from it.

It is necessary to introduce such a voting mechanism, which would make it impossible to vote repeatedly.

The Rada-3 electronic voting system is established in the Ukrainian parliament. It counts how many and which buttons the MPs pressed to vote for a particular bill.

Now the voting is as follows: within 10 seconds, the MP must press one of the buttons on the electronic voting machine – “for”, “against” or “abstained”, after which the electronic system counts each press of the button. Thus, during these 10 seconds, one MP can run through the plenary hall pressing buttons – and all these votes will be counted.

And here – the problem of repeated voting is almost wholly solved without disconnecting cards, installation of cameras, and anything else.

The only question is, what to do with the second hand of the MP? After all, the most cunning parliamentarians will be able to press two buttons – their own and someone else’s – during the voting.

According to Volodymyr Flonts, it is already placed in the electronic voting machines in Verkhovna Rada. But it is not turned on in the Verkhovna Rada.

The principle of voting using the touch and mechanical buttons is as follows: within 10 seconds, the MP must press the voting button with one hand and the other hand hold on the touch button. The buttons are placed on the electronic voting machine so that you can not press both with one hand.

Thus, both hands of the MP will be occupied. It is the end of the story with the possibility of multiple voting because there will be no physical opportunity to vote several times. It is proved by Kyiv City Council’s example, where since the introduction of the touch button (2015), “button pushers” have not been detected.

There were several generations of electronic voting systems in the Verkhovna Rada. All of them are developed in Ukraine. The first Rada was introduced in 1990, the second – in 1993, and Rada-3 – in 2002. This system still functions in the Ukrainian parliament.

After the development of the third generation, scientists immediately began working on the next one. But this invention is not so new either, because, for example, the Kyiv City Council has been operating the Rada-4 system since 2015.

The head of the NGO “Electronic Democracy” notes that “Rada-3” and “Rada-4” differ fundamentally only in the size of the monitor. In the third one – black and white screen, small font, inconvenient to read. In the fourth one – a large and color screen. The developers wanted to make a touch screen additionally, but it is not provided in the current version of “Rada-4”.

Yes, when Rada-3 was made, it had only a mechanical voting button. In 2008, the Rada-3 installed in parliament was retrofitted with a touch button instead of changing the entire system. But this second button wasn’t simply turned on.

During the VIII convocation of the Verkhovna Rada, the two-button voting mechanism was tested. All the nuances have been corrected. There was a real chance to introduce a principle that would make “button pushing” impossible: when an MP has to hold the voting button with one hand and the touch button with the other hand within 10 seconds.

However, it was decided to introduce new rules not at the last session of the VIII convocation but for the new Verkhovna Rada. As a result, nothing has changed. On the day when a public test of the Rada-3 system with a touch button was scheduled, the Security Service of Ukraine (SSU) and State Bureau of Investigation (SBI) detectives entered the Verkhovna Rada and blocked the work of the parliament’s computer center. A new mechanism has not been introduced.

This project aims to promote peace and stability in Ukraine by supporting the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine (VRU) to play its central role in formulating, implementing, monitoring and reforming security policy.

The main stakeholders of the project took part in the event. In particular, the event was attended by representatives of the two parliamentary committees of the Verkhovna Rada, with which the Agency and the PArliamentary Centre will work closely during the project – members of the Security, Defense and Intelligence Committee and the Law Enforcement Committee – as well as other Ukrainian MPs, Canadian MPs, H.E. Ambassador of Canada to Ukraine and the H.E. Ambassador of Ukraine to Canada.

During the event, the participants expressed hope for productive cooperation between the Canadian and Ukrainian sides for the sake of achieving peace, security, and stability in Ukraine.

Dmytro Razumkov, Chairperson of The Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, noted that issues of national security have become one of the key issues on the agenda of society and the state in Ukraine.

Olena Kondratiuk, Deputy Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, stressed the importance of taking into account the gender aspect in the reform of the defense sector. The speaker noted that Ukraine has consistently implemented the National Action Plan for the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1325 “Women, Peace & Security”, which is part of the government’s strategy. The parliament of the previous convocation passed a number of laws that opened more opportunities for women to exercise in the military.

In turn, Larisa Galadza, H.E. Ambassador of Canada to Ukraine, is confident that the Canadian experience will help Ukraine in defense sector reform. In addition, she noted the special role of parliament in the reform process.

Andriy Shevchenko, H.E. Ambassador of Ukraine to Canada, also believes that the project “Parliamentary Accountability for the Security Sector in Ukraine” will have a positive impact for both parties:

Tom Cormier, CEO of the Parliamentary Centre, spoke about the mission of the Canadian Parliamentary Centre and stressed the importance of helping the parliaments in democratic countries.

Svitlana Matviienko, Executive Director of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives, noted that the idea of ​​the project has been developed together with representatives of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine so that the project would be of maximum benefit to the parliament of this and future convocations.

Oleksandr Zavitnevych, Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Security, Defense and Intelligence, and Denys Monastyrskyi, Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Law Enforcement, also expressed their expectations regarding the project.

Denys Monastyrskyi, Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Law Enforcement, also stressed the importance of strengthening parliamentary control as one of the levers in the reform process.

A colleague of Ukrainian parliamentarians from Canada, Yvan Baker, MP, Chairperson of the Canada-Ukraine Parliamentary Friendship Group, said that Canada has always supported Ukraine, especially in matters of security and sovereignty of Ukraine.

Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, MP, Chairwoman of the Verkhovna Rada Committee on Ukraine’s Integration into the European Union, Member of the Interparliamentary Relations Group with Canada, also noted that Ukraine needs substantial expert support from the Canadian side to continue the path of comprehensive reform.

Anita Vandenbeld, Member of the House of Commons of Canada, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister of Defense of Canada, said that cooperation within the project is very important because in this way Canadian and Ukrainian MPs will be able to share best practices bilaterally. She also called for a gender component to be included in the discussions on defense sector reform, as the inclusion of women in the dialogue could help to look at the problem from a different angle and find new solutions.

At the end of the opening event, the Director of the Analytical Department of the Agency Oleksandr Zaslavskyi and the Director of the Partnerships and Program Development of the Parliamentary Centre Ivo Balinov spoke in detail about the essence, stages, and components of the project “Parliamentary Accountability for the Security Sector in Ukraine”.

In turn, Ivo Balinov noted that the Agency and the Parliamentary Centre are ready to cooperate with other projects that Canada is implementing in Ukraine in the security and defense sector.