Chairman of the State Duma Budget and Tax Committee Vitaly Shuba
Photo: Dmitry Dukhanin
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Budget Code Won't Favor Duma
The State Duma passed the second reading of the new edition of the Budget Code yesterday. Changes necessary for the Finance Ministry to change the structure of the federal budget next year were passed almost without discussion and amendments transferring discretion over federal target programs from the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade to the Duma were rejected. According to Kommersant's sources, Duma speaker Boris Gryzlov decided the fate of that initiative.
The first reading of the new Budget Code, authored by the Finance Ministry was on March 7. After that, more than 1500 amendments to it were submitted by Duma members, and 40 were submitted by the government. Two hundred sixty-two amendments were chosen in committee. Government amendments, introduced on the initiative of the Finance Ministry to enable it to restructure the budget next year, were all passed.
Amendments proposed by Duma members to gain control over troublesome financing of federal target programs and federal recipient-oriented programs were reduced to making all investment projects worth over 8 billion rubles subject to a separate entry in the budget. Before, only projects worth 10 billion rubles were given that treatment.
Attempts to beef up funding of regions and municipalities were largely unsuccessful as well, but more proceeds from land management going to regions were increased from the proposed 50 percent to 80 percent.
The third reading of the draft code will take place next Friday.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Apr. 12, 2007
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