Enquiring Rosstat Wants to Know
The State Duma of Russia yesterday passed the first reading of the draft law “On the Official Statistical Account,” which requires businesses to provide Rosstat, the state statistics service, with any information it requires, even if that information is a state or commercial secret. Rosstat head Vladimir Sokolin remarked to the lawmakers that this was the third attempt to pass a law of this type, and that Russia is practically the last country in the world where no such law is on the books.
Sokolin told Kommersant that Rosstat has access to information that is considered a commercial secret already, but only when it requests it. After the new law is passed, those requests will be replaced a by “federal statistical observation form.” According to Sokolin, the new law will not lead to significant changes. Rosstat already receives the information it needs, and the new law will simply “reinforce existing rules.” There has only been a single instance of the violation of those rules in recent times. A year ago, Viktor Baturin, general director of OOO Inteko-Agro, refused to take part in the All-Russia Agricultural Census. “In accordance with the Administrative Procedure Code, he was fined 5000 rubles,” Sokolin said, “although that punishment, of course, was symbolic.”
The new law declares that confidential information received by Rosstat will remain an official secret. Not all legislators were convinced of that, however. Deputy speaker of the Duma Vladimir Katrenko noted that “You can easily find secret material from the Interior Ministry or Federal Tax Service at any bookstall today” and said that the new law “causes worry, and not without reason.” Sokolin gave assures that leaks will not occur in his agency.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Sep. 05, 2007
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