No one likes to have debts, but many have them, but a good uncle has not yet come to anyone and said: I forgive you all your debts.! Then the kind uncle adds: I’m not going to pay them for you either... Brad, isn’t it?

However, it is precisely such an initiative that smart uncles from the Verkhovna Rada are now promoting, who offer to write off all debts for housing and communal services that have arisen since February 24, 2022, during the period of hostilities.

We are talking about bill No. 8367, article 2 of which reads: “The debt of the population for housing and communal services, which was formed during the period of military (combat) operations in the territories where consumer housing is located, and after the Decree of the President of Ukraine was put into effect, is to be written off”.

well forgotten old.

20 years ago, on February 20, 2003, President of Ukraine Leonid Kuchma signed the Law “On the restructuring of debts on rent, payment for housing and communal services, consumed gas and electricity”, according to which it was allowed to stretch in time (restructure) the payment of debts for a communal apartment by.

The authors of the draft law No. 8367 chose to amend the said law, adapting it (as they think) to the current situation. On the one hand, they copied the idea of \u200b\u200bdebt restructuring, and on the other hand, they creatively added: they also offered to forgive the debt, but not all, but only that arose during the conduct of hostilities in the territories where the debtors' housing is located.

The first thing that raises the question is how to define such territories? If “shaheeds” and missiles regularly fly to Kyiv, air defense works, there are hits, wounded and killed, then, obviously, hostilities are taking place. At the same time, by order of the Ministry of Reintegration No. 14 dated 13. 01. 2023, that is, Mrs. Vereshchuk, the capital was excluded from the list of territories of hostilities. But after all, all Ukrainians are regularly informed that there is a threat of missile strikes throughout Ukraine, which means that hostilities are possible everywhere....

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At the same time, the Ukrainians who remained in the country are already accustomed to working, studying and generally living in such conditions.. And attacks by drones and missiles, which means, of course, hostilities, should not be a reason not to pay for utilities and other services that they receive.. Therefore, it is possible that the authors of the bill need to move away from the reference to the territories of hostilities, and to determine the territories where it was impossible to provide and pay for housing and communal services. Obviously, this should be the main criterion for the implementation of any social initiatives, in particular this one, about which I have serious doubts..

The second question arises among consumers of housing and communal services, who not only remained in the conditional territory of hostilities, but also regularly paid for services: what the hell did I pay? So there are obvious contradictions in the field of social justice, because no one is going to return money to such families. At least not in the bill..

Finally, the third question: who will compensate utilities for the costs of their work? After all, it is impossible to say in advance, without studying the situation in each particular case, that they have completely stopped. Theoretically, they could and did supply water, gas or electricity even in combat conditions, immediately after the de-occupation or before it.. And here a separate question arises of determining the time frame for the period of hostilities or the time when it was impossible to provide services and pay for them..

Instead, the authors of the bill solved these difficult issues very simply - none of the public utilities should be compensated for anything.. In the justification from the explanatory note, it is written somewhat ambiguously, but very expressively: “At the time of introduction, it does not involve expenses from the state budget of Ukraine”.

In the history of independent Ukraine, the issue of writing off debts for housing and communal services arose repeatedly. It is clear that this is a very fertile ground for populist speculations of politicians, but they never came to fruition (which cannot be said about the cancellation of debts to some large public and private companies, of which only vague memories remain).

And this applies not only to social justice, when some regularly pay, while others evade it.. This is a question of the stability of state institutions and law: either the contractual legal principles of economic relations in the housing and utilities sector work, or in some situation you can forget about law and law and play the role of a good uncle - if you owe someone, I forgive your debt.

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How to pay debts.

The problem of indebtedness in the housing and utilities sector is perhaps the most painful, and the level of indebtedness is an important social indicator of the well-being of the population, which indicates that the size of housing and communal tariffs corresponds to the income level of the population. The diagram shows that since 2017, the debt of the population has been growing rapidly and at the end of 2021 reached the amount of UAH 81.4 billion. So there is a problem, but the authors of bill No. 8367, mentioning this cosmic amount in the explanatory note, for some reason did not think about solving the problem as a whole, but limited themselves to paying off the debt (by the way, unknown) only during the hostilities, which, of course, is incomparably.

Without undue sentimentality, they wrote in the draft law: “Subject to restructuring: debt for services for the supply and distribution of natural gas for the needs of household consumers, which was formed after the Decree of the President of Ukraine “On the introduction of martial law in Ukraine” dated February 24, 2022”. Then the authors similarly went through all services, except for the maintenance fee for apartment buildings.. Why not a word about her, absolutely incomprehensible.

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As for the positive aspects of the project, it must be admitted that the authors limited the amount of monthly current payments and debt repayment payments to 25% of household income, which is determined when calculating the amount of subsidies for working people, and 20% of income for pensioners and other persons living off social.

Here, of course, doubts arise about the realism of certain percentages, since in fact a large number of families, especially in cities (where there is a full range of utilities), have to pay much more than a quarter of their income every month, and pensioners - in general, half of the pension, otherwise. That is, a paradoxical situation may arise: in the presence of debt, the family will pay less than in its absence.

But such a settlement of the amount of the monthly payment requires mandatory intervention from the state, because now the debtor is absolutely powerless in front of the local monopolist, which is virtually every utility company in a city or village.

This monopolist can set the debtor the amount of the monthly payment he wants, and he has no choice, because otherwise he will simply be cut off gas, electricity or other service that can technically be cut off.. And there are many such examples..

The authors of the bill had a chance to solve the problem of debt, which is difficult and painful for everyone - both debtors and creditors, but they did not go the hard way of finding its solution, but the simple way of cheap populism.

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Read more articles by Alexander Sergienko at the link.