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Vladimir Ryzhkov: "It's crazy when legislation is unconstitutional"

The party said "must"! During the eight years of the dominance of the "party of power" in the State Duma, a huge set of legislation has been created, which, in fact, cancels the Constitution and redistributes the country's wealth in favor of the bureaucracy

Vladimir Ryzhkov, State Duma deputy 1993–2007

The work of United Russia in the parliament proceeded in three main directions. The first is the abolition of the constitutional rights of citizens. The second is the reduction or elimination of social benefits for citizens. The third is a change in the budgetary priorities of the state. Assault on freedom

First of all, the lawmaking of the "United Russia" affected the core of the Basic Law - the rights and freedoms of man and citizen. It's crazy when legislation is unconstitutional. But this is exactly what happened through the efforts of EP. was adopted A law on a referendum , which makes it virtually impossible to conduct a popular poll, that is, it removes citizens from direct participation in the management of state affairs.

New electoral laws led to a radical reduction in voting rights. First, citizens lost the right to elect governors. Then they were deprived of the opportunity to directly elect deputies from the territories, in single-member constituencies. Today, a Russian citizen de facto cannot become a presidential candidate, although this is guaranteed to him by the Constitution upon reaching 35 years of age. To use your passive suffrage, you must either be a candidate from the Duma party (and there are only four of them), or collect two million signatures in one month (which the CEC still has to recognize as genuine!) It is unrealistic for an opposition-minded politician to pass through this "sieve" recall the last parliamentary and presidential "elections".

It was United Russia that adopted the law on parties, which did not exist in the 1990s. The logic of this law (as well as any one that develops the provisions of the Constitution) should be to help citizens exercise their constitutional right to association. The law adopted by the State Duma is prohibitive. A political party must have at least 50,000 members and must have branches in two-thirds of the regions. In fact, a whole system has been created that makes it difficult to create parties and contributes to the "clearing" of the political space for one monopoly political force. It is no coincidence that 30 parties have been closed in Russia in recent years, among which are well-established, well-known political parties. And not a single new one has appeared. The Constitution says: "The freedom of activity of public associations is guaranteed." And the new law on NGOs severely limited the right of citizens to associate. On the basis of this law, some organizations were liquidated, others were forced to be distracted from their main activities by litigation with the state and bureaucratic red tape. The law has become a sword of Damocles, especially for human rights organizations and public associations trying to control the bureaucracy.

The constitution guarantees freedom of speech. But it is precisely in recent years that there has been no freedom left in Russia on television, where Soviet-era censorship has actually been established, and attempts are being made to impose control over the dissemination of information (and even opinions!) On the Internet. The law on rallies and demonstrations gave the bureaucrats a tool to protect the authorities from "street" democracy. If a rally or demonstration is of an oppositional nature, in 9 cases out of 10 the organizers are denied permission to hold it or measures of intimidation are applied to the demonstrators. When legislation conflicts with the Constitution, a special mechanism should operate - the Constitutional Court. But the Constitutional Court is de facto under the control of the Kremlin; over the past eight years, it has never gone against Putin and United Russia.

social pruner

The second area of ​​activity of United Russia was connected with the vital interests of citizens and concerned the abolition of many social benefits and guarantees. It's about monetizing benefits. For this, about 60 laws have been revised. A number of social guarantees for servicemen, policemen, and victims of political repressions have been abolished. The privileges of officials are not affected.

In the 1990s, pensioners and other categories had the opportunity to receive medicines free of charge. Now preferential drug provision has been turned into an insanely complicated bureaucratic procedure, when sick and elderly people have to stand in line at polyclinics and therapists.

There was no real housing reform. Housing and communal services payments are approaching the average European level, while the level of service has not changed for the better, and the incomes of many citizens remain extremely low.

There are new burdens for citizens . The most scandalous example is auto insurance . In fact, this is a new tax . Poor quality of service, a lot of deceptions by insurance companies, mass dissatisfaction of car owners. is now A sharp increase in the taxation of housing, real estate tax being prepared. The introduction of compulsory home insurance is being discussed. Insurance companies are lobbying for more and more new ways to withdraw money from citizens.

In general, the availability of education, healthcare, and housing has greatly decreased even compared to the 1990s. Everything has been converted into a commercial format and has become much more burdensome for the population.

money to money

"United Russia" has significantly changed the structure of state budget expenditures. Even in the 1990s, due to inertia, the top priority in spending was the maintenance of the housing stock, housing and communal services, health care, education, and science. Now the first three items of expenditure look different. The most gigantic expenses are for power structures (Ministry of Defense, Ministry of Internal Affairs, FSB, prosecutor's office, tax service, customs, etc.). On them in aggregate expenses have grown in 8-10 times.

There has been a huge increase in public investment. This seems to be good: the construction of bridges, roads, infrastructure. But from 30% to 60% of these funds, according to experts, is embezzled. This is the main feeding ground for the corrupt bureaucracy. It is there, and not at all on bribes, that the main money is stolen. The cost of maintaining the state bureaucracy has grown. Over the years, the state bureaucracy has built new buildings for itself, all high-ranking officials drive expensive foreign cars. And the share of expenditures on education, healthcare, social policy in the consolidated GDP either did not increase at all, or even decreased. That is, there was a redistribution of income from the needs of the country's population to the needs of the corrupt bureaucracy .

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The most dangerous thing that the United Russia legislators, obedient to the Kremlin, have done is the elimination of control over power by society . Today, all instruments of control have been destroyed: there is no free press, no opposition in parliament, and the authorities have become absolutely non-transparent. This led to an explosive, tenfold increase in corruption and a colossal decline in management efficiency. Eight years ago, according to the rating of the Davos Forum, Russia was in 60th place in terms of the quality of public administration. Today - 116th place out of 131 countries. This is a real assessment of Putin's "stability" and "efficiency" of the power vertical.