Click on the nose

Having passed two successful election campaigns in a row, Pskov YABLOKO is ready to fight for the post of governor

Last week, the leader of the Pskov YABLOKO, Lev Shlosberg, met with journalists and summed up the results of the political season. The first political season, when the party he led became parliamentary in the region. Despite that December victory, Mr. Shlosberg is still confident that YABLOK did not get the earned mandates: “We should have had 4 deputies, 2 in a single constituency and 2 in single-mandate constituencies. This is - neither more nor less - 10 percent of the entire composition of the regional Assembly. And this would be a completely different political relationship in the regional parliament.

At a meeting with journalists, which lasted longer than planned, Lev Shlosberg tried to talk about all the pressing issues, in the “promotion” and “debugging” of which the regional “YABLOKO” was involved. If we recall the recent history of the Pskov region, many of them turned out to be scandalous. They discussed the closure of small rural schools and the modernization of healthcare. According to Mr. Shlosberg, largely as a result of this struggle, a “tailoring social wind” blew towards YABLOKO.

“I was sure that we would get into the regional Assembly. Partly, this confidence was based on successful municipal campaigns, but, in addition, I was confident in the created team,” the deputy shared with reporters.

Moreover, according to the leader of the Pskov YABLOKO, the party is ready to participate in the gubernatorial elections, which are scheduled to take place in March 2014. True, Mr. Shlosberg, like his colleagues in the opposition, understands the level of the notorious municipal filters that are presented to candidates for governor by the new legislation [ 1 ]. But these filters make Yabloko want to encounter them: “In the automotive industry there is such a thing as a crash test, when a car is tested for strength. They erected a barrier wall for us, being confident that it was insurmountable. But we are ready to try. If we overcome the filters, it will be a miracle. If not, we will inform you at what stage of collecting signatures we stopped. This will be a test of the system."

From public policy the conversation smoothly flowed into a discussion of issues of culture, health care, education and more, but inevitably the conversation returned to politics. More precisely, to the functionality of the regional parliament, in which Lev Shlosberg has worked for more than eight months, being deputy chairman of the committee on legislation, economic policy and local government and heading the YABLOKO faction.

In the ironic opinion of the deputy, today’s Pskov Regional Assembly is “not a Mercedes or even a Niva-Chevrolet, but somehow this car drives.”

But the question, apparently, is not how, but where exactly he is going.

Despite the fact that the number of opposition deputies in the new convocation of the Pskov Parliament has increased, Lev Shlosberg called the interaction of the oppositionists with United Russia the main problem: “The most difficult thing is when you see the obvious, when it is clear what and how to do, when everything on the surface, and don’t push through.”

“Okay, when there are disputes on issues of a political nature: how to seat deputies in their offices? How to make sure that someone, God forbid, does not receive some wrong position, a higher status than he, the damned oppositionist, is entitled to... At our Council meetings, certain discussions are, in my opinion, simply anomalous in nature . This is where the famous phrase about “respected people” came from. It belongs to a colleague [Valentin] Kalensky. When we began to discuss the latest changes in the structure of the Assembly, he asked: “Where are we going to put the respected people?” Actually, we didn’t put them anywhere. We are the Legislative Assembly, we must work effectively, that’s all. But when the concern is to seat the right “respected person” in his assigned place so that he will be even more “respected,” this, generally speaking, causes shame,” Mr. Schlosberg spoke frankly.

“In the Assembly, it is very important who proposed the initiative: some deputies from the majority are not engaged in the implementation of their own initiatives, but in creating opportunities for the non-implementation of other people’s initiatives,” Mr. Shlosberg outlined the peculiarity of Pskov parliamentary life.

I remembered how confidently the chairman of the regional Assembly, Alexander Kotov, recently spoke: “that’s how the people voted.”

Lev Shlosberg again raised the issue of the relationship between the quantity and quality of deputy chairmen of the regional Assembly: “Does the Assembly need deputy chairmen who are not responsible for committees? We don’t need it!”, the deputy recalled the months-long debate about how many people should sit next to the chairman of the Assembly and what they should do.

However, there remain two vice-speakers in the regional Assembly who do not head committees: Valentin Kalensky, who oversees interparliamentary relations, and Elena Bibikova, who is responsible for the youth parliament.

The topic of healthcare was raised at the press conference more than once, and most of all, of course, the discussion was about the Dedovichi district hospital, for which YABLOKO fought and about which Pskov Province wrote more than once2. According to Lev Shlosberg, the victory of YABLOKO candidate Igor Gumenyuk in the elections for the head of the district was largely the result of the struggle to preserve the hospital.

“Modernization of healthcare is the most unsuccessful all-Russian reform, even worse than modernization of education,” Lev Shlosberg noted bitterly. – The list of services is being reduced significantly, intensive care units, children’s and surgical departments are being closed. What is the closure of intensive care, for example, in the Dnovsky district, where there is a large railway junction and several unguarded busy railway crossings?

The absence of children's departments in most district hospitals, according to the deputy, leads to the fact that maternity departments cannot function properly.

“In the Dedovichi district in 2010 and 2011, the children’s department fulfilled the volume of beds. The costs of the department were entirely covered by insurance funds from the Compulsory Medical Insurance Fund. When representatives of the Compulsory Medical Insurance Fund speak at sessions of the Assembly and report: “We are saving money!”, I cannot understand this. In my opinion, saving money means that someone was not paid for treatment!”

Now in the Dedovichi district hospital there are only six day hospital beds left in the children's department, which cost almost half a million rubles a year, but for which round-the-clock medical supervision is not provided. More than 150 thousand rubles are needed to transport children from Dedovich to Porkhov. per year only for gasoline from regional center to regional center.

“This year, 51 children were brought to the Porkhov Central District Hospital from Dedovich. 80% of the children who were hospitalized stayed there for two to three days, after which the parents took the children with a signature. The children are very worried, crying, and the parents do not have the money to constantly travel to Porkhov. From 26 families we received receipts refusing hospitalization,” Mr. Shlosberg cites sad statistics.

Lev Shlosberg, already as deputy chairman of the Pskov branch of VOOPIiK, commented on the situation with the refusal of UNESCO experts to include the Pskov Kremlin in the World Cultural Heritage List in the serial nomination “Kremlins of Russia”3: “We received a click on the nose. The people who prepared the documents are surprised that the initiative did not receive support. But it’s time to learn: monuments where reinforced concrete is used during restoration cannot be included in the UNESCO list. They started using concrete - that’s it, forget about UNESCO, forget about the standards of European tourism.”

Budgetary municipal cultural institutions in the Pskov region, after the administration’s refusal to increase the estimated standard for their maintenance, will face very difficult times, and the methods of “curing cultural hunger” caused a critical smile from the deputy: “It is planned to purchase and use mobile mobile complexes. One can imagine that three buses with the inscription “Culture” on the side will appear, which will visit every volost center once every six months or, say, three months and ask local residents: what do you want, read the British Library (as the chairman of the culture committee promised us Alexander Golyshev)? Or will they sit down and read all the newspapers for six months at once?!”

Mr. Shlosberg reminded reporters that from June 7 he headed the standing committee on cultural policy of the Parliamentary Association of North-West Russia and assured that the committee would meet in Pskov.

One of the first initiatives that the committee may take up will be the legal protection of municipal museums: “In 2010, the Pustoshkinsky Museum was saved from closure. The head of the district considered that the district simply did not need him. But the museum cost the municipal budget only 100 thousand rubles a year. We found ways to save money.”

Lev Shlosberg expressed confidence that the Pskov region needs a regional program for the preservation of municipal museums.

Which, of course, somehow, like many other laws and programs, will still need to be “pushed through.”

Denis KAMALYAGIN

1 See: D. Kamalyagin. It's a traffic jam // “PG”, No. 24 (596) June 20-26, 2012

2 See: L. Shlosberg. Lawnmower // “PG”, No. 36 (558) from September 21-27, 2011; L. Schlosberg. Recommended to die / “PG”, No. 38 (560) from October 5-11, 2011; “The situation will not only not improve, but will worsen” // “PG”, No. 38 (560) from October 5-11, 2011; “During this time no one was interested in our problems” // “PG”, No. 38 (560) from October 5-11, 2011; L. Schlosberg. The real people's front // “PG”, No. 39 (561) from October 12-18, 2011; D. Deeva. Reception restlessness // “PG”, No. 40 (562) from October 19-25, 2011; D. Kamalyagin. Conductor, press the brakes // “PG”, No. 6 (578) from February 15-21, 2012

3 See: L. Shlosberg. We lose and don’t cry // “PG”, No. 26 (598) from July 4-10, 2012