Despite the war, Ukraine continues to develop and provide public services to citizens. One of the key groups of administrative services is the registration of acts of civil status (RAGS). Its criticality lies in the fact that these services are needed even during the war, because people are born, marry, die. These services are impossible to avoid and difficult to postpone.

In order to understand the volume of demand for only three basic civil registry services, let's give a few figures. Over 717,000 deaths recorded in 2021. Almost 500 thousand more services - registration of births and marriages.

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Unfortunately, it is easy to see on the example of the “death registration service” that the state, after the enlargement of territorial communities, did not fulfill its promise not to allow services to be removed.

The dynamics of registration is such that the executive bodies of local councils in 2021 amounted to 71 thousand less act records than in 2020. But the departments of the Ministry of Justice of such registrations amounted to almost 170 thousand more. If we evaluate in proportions, then compared to 2020, it has almost doubled and is more than 1 to 5 in favor of the Ministry of Justice.

A bitter example of this sad statistic. It is bad that even on such tragic days, the relatives of the deceased cannot register the death in their own village or township, but are forced to spend time and money (including on the road) to visit the registry office of the Ministry of Justice. The same disappointing dynamics and services for registration of birth and marriage.

We must honestly admit that even before October 2020, there were problems with the RAGS sphere. The Ministry of Justice officially holds on to these services, taking care, first of all, of filling the special fund of its budget.. Yes, it is a strange logic when a public authority thinks not about the availability of services for citizens, but about its own departmental budget. But it was like that even before the big war, when there were much more resources.

Thus, after the final enlargement of the communities, the situation in the field of civil registration is significantly worsening. Because even the rural communities that exercised the powers of the RAGS are losing them. And services will continue to move away, because all government bodies are now “optimizing” their networks.

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What is wrong here?

Yes, in fact, first of all, the failure to fulfill the main postulate of the reform promised by the state, that during decentralization, services will not move away from people. After all, the powers of the RAGS used to be carried out even by the smallest rural and settlement councils. After the amalgamation of communities, this issue fell on a separate decision of local self-government bodies (LSG) and the Ministry of Justice. Unfortunately, it is known that the Ministry of Justice is consistently “persuading” the local government bodies not to take these powers..

You can also reproach the local self-government organizations, which in this situation do not take enough care of residents who do not live in the center of the community, and force them to travel to the former district centers. But it is also not entirely fair to blame the CHI, because if the Ministry of Justice “earns” on these services (with solemn ceremonies, dubious paid consultations, “marriage for a day” for thousands of hryvnias), then the CHI does not have such “earnings”. For them, these powers are additional expenses from the budget and additional hassle with forms, safes, registers, etc..

On April 29, 2021, in order to solve the problem with the services of the Civil Registry Office, the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, by a constitutional majority, adopted a law that equalized the powers of all territorial communities (rural, township, city, inclusive with former cities of regional significance). That is, all MHIs can potentially take on three basic services of the Civil Registry Office.

In practice, the law almost did not work.. Only more enterprising cities began to receive powers. But systemically, the trend is quite the opposite.. RAGS services are disappearing from rural areas and are moving to a departmental format of provision. The Ministry of Justice acted here not only by persuasion, but also by new approaches to interpreting the law (on the status of a legal entity for the executive committee or ASC, the requirements to train the personnel of the MHI and the scope of their powers, etc.)..

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There are many more reasons why the situation is wrong.. You just need to consider the following:.

RAGS - the easiest of the administrative services. Why they continue to be provided by the ministry, and not by compulsory medical insurance in each community, is not clear, from the point of view of the logic of government;

each visit for such a service to the GRAGS body of the Ministry of Justice - lost time (day) and citizens' funds;

it is a security issue (in conditions of war, covid, lack of electricity and transport);

this question of trust in the reform, in the state.

Unfortunately, there is no hope that the Ministry of Justice will change its position and give up these powers in favor of CHI. It seems that this ministry does not trust local self-government. Therefore, the same big problems are in the field of state registration of real estate and business, where testing for registrars has not been carried out since the summer of 2021, and this profession is becoming scarce.

So it remains only to appeal to the new head of the " It is necessary to demand systemic organizational measures from the government so that these extremely important services are available in every territorial community, in every Starostinsky district. Take care of your residents.

The model “through the ASC in cooperation with the Ministry of Justice” is not suitable here, because these are mostly fast (urgent) services, so that neither a person has the opportunity to wait for a certificate from the Ministry of Justice to be brought to him, nor does it make sense for the CHI in such trips and interactions. That is why the services of the Civil Registry Office are very poorly represented in the ASC. That is, the most complete delegation of authority in the CHI should be implemented here.

Without these decisions, due to departmental interests, more and more citizens of Ukraine are forced to travel considerable distances, waste time on visits and scold the authorities..

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Read more articles by Viktor Tymoshchuk at the link.