The study analyzes the experience of Ukraine’s cooperation with the European Commission for Democracy through Law (Venice Commission), outlines the main areas and philosophy of the Venice Commission, the principles and standards that it guides, and the methods of its work. Particular attention is paid to the importance of studying and incorporating into the preparation and improvement of legislation not only the recommendations given in the Conclusions on Ukraine but also the generalized studies of the Venice Commission as part of the “European Constitutional Heritage”. The author concludes that Ukraine’s readiness to cooperate with the Venice Commission and taking into account the provided recommendations is a certain indicator of the democratic processes that are taking place in the state and Ukraine’s commitment to European values.

On November 18-19, 2016, the Sixth International Conference “Parliamentary Readings” took place at the House of Official Receptions (Kyiv, 22, Hrushevskoho Str.).

The Conference was organized by the Agency for Legislative Initiatives in partnership with the Faculty of Legal Sciences, Faculty of Social Sciences and Social Technologies of the National University of “Kyiv-Mohyla Academy” and the Department of Parliamentarism and Political Management of the National Academy of Public Administration under the President of Ukraine.

Welcome speeches were delivered by Ihor Kohut, Director of the USAID RADA Program, Oleksandr Zaslavskyi, Deputy Chairman of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives, Denys Azarov, Dean of the Faculty of Law of the National University of “Kyiv-Mohyla Academy”, Vasyl Kuibida, President of the National Academy of Public Management under the President of Ukraine.

Serhiy Holovatyi, founder and President of the Ukrainian Legal Foundation, Minister of Justice of Ukraine (1995-1997, 2005-2006), made a presentation entitled “20 Years of the Constitution: Assessment and Retrospective”.

On November 18, thematic sections covered the following issues:
• Parliamentary Reforms (Parliament at the Crossroads)
• Parliamentary Ethics: The Path toward Legitimation

The first section was moderated by Oleksandr Zaslavskyi, Deputy Chairman of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives, while its keynote speaker was Denys Yakovlev, Professor, Dean of the Faculty of Political Science and Sociology, National University “Odessa Law Academy”.

The section devoted to parliamentary ethics was moderated by Svitlana Matviienko, Chairwoman of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives; keynote speakers were Ihor Kohut, Director of the USAID RADA Program and Yuliia Tyshchenko, Head of Civil Society Development Programs at the Ukrainian Center for Independent Political Research.

On November 19, speakers focused on the prospects of development of Ukrainian parliamentarism and parliamentary activity in the context of the enforcement of democratic principles.

Sections were moderated by Olena Ivashchenko, Doctor of Law, Institute of International Relations of Taras Shevchenko National Universiy of Kyiv, and Oksana Shcherbaniuk, Chair of Department, Doctor of Law, Associate Professor of Yurii Fedkovych Chernivtsi National University.

Vsevolod Rechytskyi, PhD, Associate Professor of the Yaroslav Mudryi National Law Academy of Ukraine, discussed the topic “Can Ukraine Have an Official Constitutional Doctrine?”.

Parliamentary Readings 2016 came to a close by announcing the winners of the essay contest dedicated to the memory of Professor of Political Science Yuriy Shveda.

The conference is part of the project implemented by the Agency for Legislative Initiatives with the support of USAID RADA Program: Responsible, Accountable, Democratic Assembly. The RADA program, implemented by the East Europe Foundation, promotes the formation of a responsible, accountable and democratic representative body.

On November 16, the Agency for Legislative Initiatives held a Training on Interparty Dialogue Skills for MPs of Ukraine in cooperation with the USAID RADA Program, the Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy, and the OSCE ODIHR in the office of the USAID RADA program.

During the two-hour presentation and interactive discussion on the interparty dialogue, the participants examined the significant differences between the notions of unanimity, compromise and consensus, as well as things that might go wrong in political negotiations in the case of wrong style and goals.

The trainer of the Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy Jerome Scheltens explained the difference between negotiation, mediation, and dialogue and why the latter can ensure sustainable win-win results.

The MPs bombarded the trainer with pointed questions, and to answer them, Mr. Scheltens had to use the entire arsenal of international experience.

The activity takes place in the framework of the project of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives “Support for Democratic Political Culture in Parliament through Political Dialogue and Ethical Standards” implemented with the support of MATRA Program (Netherlands Embassy) and in partnership with the OSCE ODIHR Project “Strengthening Dialogue Among Civil Society and With Key Government Stakeholders in Ukraine on Human Dimension Issues”, the Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy and USAID RADA Program: Responsible Accountable Democratic Assembly.

The project implies creating a dialogue platform for discussion of ethical dilemmas, which will provide for an inclusive process of the elaboration of a Code of Conduct for the Parliament or another mechanism to regulate parliamentary ethics, the approximation to international standards in accordance with the recommendations of the mission of the European Parliament, and the restoration of confidence in the Verkhovna Rada.

On November 16, 2016, at 9:00, the Subcommittee on Energy Saving and Energy Efficiency of the Committee on Fuel and Energy Complex, Nuclear Policy and Nuclear Safety held a meeting where experts of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives presented a preliminary version of the shadow report on the fulfillment of the Activity Plan for the Implementation of the National Energy Efficiency Action Plan for 2020. The full version of the report will be released in early 2017.

The activities of the ombudsman are an indispensable attribute of parliamentary control over the activities of executive bodies. The guarantee of growth of public trust to parliament and public authorities, in general, is appropriate functioning of this institute. Public reports of the Ombudsman are important documents that influence the formation of many areas of government policy.

The Roadmap on Internal Reform and Institutional Capacity Building for the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, prepared by the European Parliament’s Needs Assessment Mission (paragraph 21), focuses on the fact that “The Parliamentary Ombudsman should present annual (and where necessary, special) reports to the VRU for consideration and follow up having regard to the provisions of the Law on the Parliamentary Commissioner for Human Rights.”

Parliament is the supreme representative institution because his work is the subject of much public attention and the media in particular. Interaction with the media is the most common and most successful practice of ensuring transparency and accountability in the work of lawmakers.

The Roadmap on Internal Reform and Institutional Capacity Building for the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine (paragraph 29) says that “…The VRU staff should be exposed to international best practice and exchanges of know-how on effective parliamentary communication.”

The preparation and presentation of Parliament Journal is part of the project embodied by the Agency for Legislative Initiatives, supported by the USAID Rada Program: Responsible Accountable Democratic Assembly, implemented by the East Europe Foundation.

On November 4, 2016, in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine there was held a presentation of new e-resources that will help make Parliament activities more transparent: the Portal for Public Discussion of Draft Laws and the Electronic Register of Non-Governmental Organizations (E-Register of NGOs).

Thanks to these resources, the public will have the opportunity to contribute to the discussion of draft laws before they are submitted for consideration to specialized parliamentary committees.

The Portal for Public Discussion of Draft Laws, developed with the support of the USAID RADA Program and at the initiative of the Computerized Systems Department of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, will make it possible to citizens:

• to get acquainted with draft laws submitted to the VRU for discussion,
• to get acquainted with the work of specialized committees of the Parliament,
• to participate in the discussion of draft laws.

The Portal for Public Discussion of Draft Laws was designed in response to the recommendations of the European Parliament on internal reforms of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. It is aimed to improve its institutional capacity and step up public involvement in the legislative process.

The other tool, i.e. Electronic Register of Non-Governmental Organizations (E-Register of NGOs), is designed to ensure public consultation during the work on draft resolutions in VRU committees. The E-Register was created by the Agency for Legislative Initiatives within the framework of the USAID RADA Program.

Thanks to this resource, committees will have up-to-date information on public associations, their expert input, management and expert composition, etc. The committees will be able to use this e-resource, which currently includes more than 80 organizations, to effectively involve non-governmental organizations in cooperation with one another. An application for cooperation can be submitted here.

On October 20, 2016, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine adopted the resolution “On Conclusions and Proposals as to the Draft Law of Ukraine on the State Budget of Ukraine 2017” (hereinafter – the Resolution).

Paragraph 4 of the Resolution approved Annex 2 on the increase of salaries of MPs of Ukraine: from 25 minimum wages for members of parliamentary committees to 30 minimum wages for the Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada. Currently the minimum wage is UAH 1450.

Draft Resolution No. 5000-П “On Conclusions and Proposals as to the Draft Law of Ukraine on the State Budget of Ukraine for 2017” was submitted on 20.10.2016. Main Committee: Budget Committee.

Initiators:
• V. Amelchenko (RPL),
• V. Shkvaryliuk (NF),
• O. Horbunov (NF),
• I. Krulko (Batkivshchyna),
• I. Kulichenko (BPP),
• O. Mushak (BPP).

According to Section V of the Rules of Procedure of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine (hereinafter referred to as the Rules), the approval of the State Budget is a matter considered under a special procedure.

However, according to Section 1 of Article 153 of the Rules, “Draft Law on the State Budget of Ukraine for the next year shall be considered taking into account the provisions of the Budget Code of Ukraine and these Rules”. Thus, if no special procedure is established for a specific stage of the budget process, the relevant general rule applies.

The Draft Resolution was submitted and considered with the following violations of the laws of Ukraine:

1. The initiators submitted the draft law without accompanying documents specified in Section 1 of Art. 91 of the Rules, specifically without an explanatory note.

2. The initiators submitted the draft law without a financial feasibility study (including relevant calculations) specified in Section 3 of Art. 91 of the Rules.

3. The Secretariat of the Verkhovna Rada registered the draft law without proper supporting documents, contrary to the requirements of Sections 1 and 2 of Art. 92 of the Rules.

4. There were violations of the terms for consideration of the Resolution specified in the special procedure, namely: in accordance with the requirements of Section 1, Art. 156 of the Rules, the draft resolution was to be distributed among “MPs at least two days before the consideration of the Draft State Budget of Ukraine for the next year in the first reading by the Verkhovna Rada.” Meanwhile, it was distributed on the day of consideration, which made it impossible to properly analyze and discuss it both in Parliament and outside it.

5. The Resolution contains provisions that are incompatible with the requirements for the resolution on the conclusions and proposals for the Draft Law of Ukraine on the State Budget contained in Art. 156 of the Rules.

Given the foregoing, the following violations can be pointed out:

A) Resolution 5000-П was considered without the opinion of the main committee.

According to the requirements of Section 2, Art. 138 of the Rules, “Resolutions of the Verkhovna Rada shall be adopted on specific issues with a view to implementing its constituent, organizational, control and other functions”. Whereas, the Resolution relates to several diverse issues rather than to a specific one. Some of them concern the adoption of the State Budget 2017 and some do not.

B) The Resolution violates the principle of budget periodization

The resolution violates the principle of budget periodization described in Art. 3 of the Budget Code, which stipulates that under normal conditions the budget period coincides with the calendar year. The Resolution – which is part of the budget process 2017 as specified in its title – goes beyond the stated budget period at both ends because it includes provisions that were put into effect in 2016 and have an indefinite validity term.

B) Extralegal nature of the Resolution

The Resolution on the adoption of the draft law in the first reading also contains regulatory provisions that have a completely different legal nature. This is a gross violation of rule-making techniques and goes beyond the legal culture.

С) Violation of the Constitution

From the submission of the Resolution to its signing, the subjects of the process – the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine as a state authority, MPs of Ukraine, and the relevant employees of the Secretariat of the Verkhovna Rada as officials of the state authority – repeatedly (see previous paragraphs) acted in a manner inconsistent with the Constitution and laws of Ukraine. Thereby they violated the requirements of Section 2. Art. 19 of the Constitution. In addition, gross systemic legal violations run contrary to the provisions of Section 1. Art. 1 of the Constitution – “Ukraine is a sovereign and independent, democratic, social, law-governed state” – with regard to a law-governed state.

The illegal expediting of the Resolution adoption procedure is unlikely to be in line with this provision. While the scope of MPs’ salaries set by the Resolution (this is not even taking into account the multi-thousand additional payments) is hardly in line with the principle of a social state.

1) The Resolution does not violate the legislation in terms of sources of funding.

The Resolution does not provide for amendments to the State Budget 2016. An increase in MPs’ salaries is possible due to the redistribution of expenditures within the current estimates of the Verkhovna Rada.

The funds necessary to increase MPs’ salaries by 2017 are set out in paragraph 1.17.2. Annex 1 to the Resolution, while funds for the subsequent budget periods, in accordance with the budget law, should be budgeted for when drawing up budgets for the relevant periods. In our opinion, paragraphs 3 and 4 of the Resolution should be completely abolished, and paragraph 5 should be abolished as regards points which concern paragraphs 3 and 4.

According to estimates, the draft budget provides for an increase of nearly 107 million on labor remuneration for the Verkhovna Rada, which completely covers the increase of MPs’ official salaries.

2) The main drawback of the adopted Annex to Resolution No. 5000-П is that these changes were proposed after July 15 when the budget was adopted. The provision of the Rules is the subject of disputes. Moreover, it has been repeatedly violated during the adoption of budgets in different years.

Over the last 10-15 years, there have been numerous cases when Parliament violated this rule, and the number of these violations amounted to dozens. Consequently, almost every such case resulted in the submission of an appeal to the Constitutional Court of Ukraine. Given the history and practice of this Court, only the violation mentioned above may be the subject of consideration by the Supreme Court.

The purpose of the meeting is to develop a guideline on the draft law on public consultation with regard to the objectives, scope, target audience, format, approval, performance and other aspects of consultation and public participation in policies and decisions.

Alice Thomas, Chief of ODIHR’s Legislative Support Unit, told about the experience in implementing the guideline of the OSCE in Moldova, Armenia and Kyrgyzstan.

Deputy Chairman of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives Oleksandr Zaslavskyi presented the study concerning the involvement of NGOs in the work of parliamentary committees, which was used as a reference document for discussions in the working group. Mr. Zaslavskyi pointed out,

Based on the results of the study, O. Zaslavskyi identified the following problems with public consultations in Ukraine:

• Lack of systematicity;
• Lack of professional and technical support of the authorities for conducting public consultations, as well as of means for communicating information;
• Synchronization of work between different authorities;
• Citizens need to learn existing tools. Very often, citizens address various authorities to issues that are beyond their jurisdiction;
• Lack of statistics concerning advocacy results. Citizens do not know the real impact of public consultation, and whether there are any results of taking into account the “voice of the people”;
•  The illusion of “fast solutions”. On average, it takes several months to get a message across.

As a result, the working group decided to work out and discuss the guideline. The first version of the guideline will be written online by the experts of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives.

DIALOGUES ON PARLIAMENTARY ETHICS
When does deputy ethics transform into professional practice?
October 21, 2016, Verkhovna Rada

On October 21, II Dialogues on Parliamentary Ethics took place in the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine. Meeting participants analyzed practical cases and tried to solve ethical dilemmas. The purpose of the Dialogues is to improve the quality of the parliamentary process through the support of intra-party dialogue and promotion of ethical standards in the parliament. At the moment, there is a search for consensus on ethical standards at the regulatory level. The meeting, attended by MPs of Ukraine, was moderated by MEP Kaja Kallas.

Kaja Kallas noted that the purpose of a code of conduct is to raise the professional standards of MPs, just like any other profession, i.e. lawyer or teacher. Without doubts, everyone acts within the framework of the law but some actions may be unethical. If one deputy does so, this affects the reputation of the entire parliament. Ms. Kallas emphasized:

Ihor Kohut, Director of the USAID RADA Program: Responsible Accountable Democratic Assembly said the following:

Margit Sutrop, Professor of Practical Philosophy, Head of the Center for Ethics, University of Tartu, told about the Estonian experience of adoption of the Code of Conduct.

Dirk Toornstra, Independent Parliamentary Governance Advisor, believes that the code of conduct should be shared by all members of Parliament, and one has to be careful speaking about sanctions for noncompliance:

The meeting was held within the framework of the project of the Agency for Legislative Initiatives aimed at improving the quality of parliamentary process by supporting international dialogue and promoting ethical standards and implemented with the support of Embassy of the Netherlands in Ukraine and in partnership with OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), RADA Program, and the Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy.

During the events, an inclusive dialogue platform was created to discuss ethical dilemmas. It will serve as the basis for the elaboration of a Code of Conducts for the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine.

On October 21, at 10:30 am, in the office of USAID RADA Program: Responsible Accountable Democratic Assembly, the Agency for Legislative Initiatives held a consultative meeting within the framework of “II Dialogues on Parliamentary Ethics”, with the support of the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR), Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy and Embassy of the Netherlands in Ukraine. The meeting was broadcasted online via YouTube.

Invited experts, Margit Sutrop, Professor of Practical Philosophy, Marten Yuurik, Center for Ethics, University of Tartu, and Dirk Toornstra, Independent Governance Advisor, held a training game with representatives of NGOs involving the analysis of complex ethical cases, which will be further presented to MPs.

Ihor Kohut, Director of the USAID RADA Program: Responsible Accountable Democratic Assembly, said that parliamentary ethics was one of the cornerstones of the program in cooperation with the OSCE ODIHR. Meetings at the level of NGO experts help to “test” the game, based on cases with complex ethical challenges. He said the following:

Kateryna Ryabiko, project coordinator of the OSCE ODIHR, elaborated on the extension of the pilot project:

Margit Sutrop, Professor of Practical Philosophy, Head of the Center for Ethics, University of Tartu, noted that a code of conduct was necessary if we should take the European Parliament as an example: