Reform in three letters

Housing and communal services are dying, but they are not giving in

Today the State Duma will consider in the third reading the law on reforming the housing and communal services. However, no one is mistaken or hopeful that this will give a start to real modernization of the utility sector. Its real reform has been postponed, and for many reasons, of which the upcoming elections are simply what lies on the surface.

The first loud announcement about reforming this monster was made shortly after the 1996 elections (by Deputy Prime Minister Boris Nemtsov), and they returned to this after the 2000 elections (Deputy Prime Minister German Gref). But apart from a creeping or abrupt increase in utility tariffs, nothing came of this three-letter reform.

It is not a fact that everything declared to be the object of reform in Russia actually needed radical “reform.” Although many had itching hands, for example, Gazprom until the second half of the 90s, and later the Ministry of Railways, were structures that worked decently against the general background, which, if they required intervention, were not at all under this loud name.

However, in the case of housing and communal services, major transformations have become “imperative No. 1”. Not only that, this sphere has always been in such a state that only the Soviet population, grateful to the authorities for life, could put up with. But now this communal barracks has literally begun to fall apart. And the new Russian authorities found themselves in time trouble. You need to take Everest by storm, immediately, yesterday, with a rusty ice ax in your hands, without insurance, without a map, without guides. In importance, this reform surpasses both the military and gas and electric reforms combined. In terms of complexity, it can only be compared with administrative ones. In terms of social risks, it is generally unrivaled.

What can you choose from today? From the current sluggish “reform observation” against the backdrop of the ongoing escalation of tariffs and proposals in the spirit of the Ministry of Finance, “it’s time to destroy all these exorbitant utility benefits.” From Anatoly Chubais’s plan to create (with the participation of selected large businesses) a utility corporation that buys specially selected housing and communal services areas and manages them, taking into account the experience of RAO UES management. From the Yabloko project, which involves mass participation in housing and communal services on a competitive basis and with tax exemptions from the state of small enterprises, even before any major investments are capable of providing a basic level of public services.

Which path will the authorities choose? Will they risk indicating their preferences even before the elections? Will there be a real discussion around the problems of housing and communal services, which in intensity, intensity and details will at least come close to the long-term discussion around the details of the electricity reform that are obscure to the vast majority? Today's discussion in the Duma does not seem to answer any of these questions.

Vladimir LOEVETSKY