Government and Parliament are working together to improve legislative work

On 27 November, a meeting of the Interagency Working Group on Improving Legislative Work, Assessing Legislative Impact and Improving the Results of Laws Implementation was held.

The meeting was welcomed by the co-chairs of the meeting: First Deputy Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Oleksandr Korniienko and Minister of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine Oleh Nemchinov.

“Strengthening the role of the Government of Ukraine in the legislative process is a topical issue in connection with our European integration aspirations and the need to improve the quality of legislation and its implementation. Our Interagency Working Group aims to ensure these priorities, in particular within the framework of the negotiating chapter ‘Public Administration Reform’. At present, the Secretariat of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, together with other responsible bodies, is preparing a roadmap for the negotiations on this chapter, which will include measures to achieve the strategic result of improving the quality of legislation and building an effective mechanism for planning the legislative process and post-legislative control,” said Oleh Nemchinov, Minister of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine.

The following issues were discussed during the event:

• strengthening the role of the Government of Ukraine in the legislative process;
• cooperation between the Parliament and the Government of Ukraine in building an effective post-legislative control;
• action plan for the implementation of the Law of Ukraine “On Lawmaking”;
• organisation of official translations into Ukrainian of EU legislation and into English of Ukrainian legislation, including through the establishment of a state institution with appropriate budgetary funding.

“There are already positive results of the work – an increase in the number of adopted draft laws initiated and registered by the Government. This is one of the key indicators expected from us when joining the EU, because it means the actual transfer of the policy-making centre to the Government, which is a common European practice,” said Oleksandr Korniienko, First Deputy Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine.

In accordance with the negotiation framework for Ukraine’s accession to the EU, Ukraine needs to translate EU legal acts into Ukrainian in advance of accession, as well as to train the necessary number of interpreters and translators to ensure the functioning of EU institutions after accession.

“Given the large volume of acts to be translated as part of the negotiation process on Ukraine’s accession to the EU, there is a need to introduce a comprehensive translation system. This can be achieved by establishing a separate state agency for translation. To this end, the Secretariat of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, together with the Secretariat of the Verkhovna Rada, developed a concept for the creation of a state institution, the Translation Office, as well as proposals for improving the procedure for official translation into Ukrainian of the EU acquis communautaire and into English of Ukrainian legislation. The development of the concept took into account the recommendations of the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Translation and the EU Association4U project,” said Oleksandr Yarema, State Secretary of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine.

Photo: Andrii Nesterenko