The Business Ombudsman Council, including the Business Ombudsman Roman Waschuk and his two Deputies (Tetyana Korotka and Yulia Andrusiv) met with the First Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine, Minister of Economy of Ukraine – Yulia Svyrydenko and her colleagues Oleksii Sobolev, Deputy Minister of Economy of Ukraine and Oleksandr Palazov, Director of the Department of Regulatory Policy and Entrepreneurship. The Business Ombudsman Council, as an advisory body to the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, regularly communicates with representatives of the Government of Ukraine to not only point out urgent problems of the private sector but also to find ways to resolve them.
First of all, the Draft Declaration of Fair and Reasonable Administration, developed by the Council, became one of the key topics of the conversation. This initiative is seen as a new form of government assurance of rights for businesses and citizens. The Declaration is based on key principles of good governance, including: good faith, proportionality, prudence, as well as the rest of the general European Union legal principles. The implementation of the Declaration will be an important step towards bringing Ukraine closer to the standards of the European Union and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The parties agreed on how to measure these steps in implementing the provisions of the Declaration, in particular through the work of the “Pulse” service.
In addition, the Business Ombudsman Council presented a new direction of its activities aimed at solving problems related to the reconstruction of Ukraine. This direction covers both practical assistance to the private sector related to its reconstruction activities (in the broadest sense) and the development of recommendations for improving state policies to overcome the economic consequences of russia’s full-scale military aggression.
Finally, they discussed the problems of tax invoices suspension and the respective risk assessment monitoring system (SMKOR), the audit of which was declared in the relevant Decree of the President of Ukraine. The Business Ombudsman Roman Waschuk emphasized the importance of involving external expert assessment in the process of auditing this system. The Business Ombudsman Council once again expressed its readiness to provide its support and expertise to the central executive authorities on this issue in order to increase the efficiency and transparency of SMKOR’s work.
The sustainable dialogue between the Business Ombudsman Council and the Ministry of Economy over the past 10 years contributes to the effective resolution of business issues.
