Agenda: Review of the performance of housing, electricity, and other utility companies during the autumn-winter season; support for airports in southern and central Russia; and support for museums.
Excerpts from the transcript:
Government meeting
Mikhail Mishustin: Good afternoon, colleagues.
Russia is completing the heating season. It is already over in most regions of the country.
Today, we will review the performance of housing, electricity and other utility companies during this season. This is a very sensitive matter for our people. The President emphasised the need to create comfortable conditions not only in houses and flats but also in all institutions without exception, and to repair any damage as soon as possible.
In 2020, the Government launched a uniform system for monitoring incidents at housing and utility facilities. More data suppliers are joining this system; coverage is growing all the time, which helps property managers make quicker decisions on repairs or equipment replacement when necessary. This past season, the monitoring system made it possible to reduce the number of emergencies in housing and utilities by one third compared to the previous year.
Today we will discuss in detail the results of the season and review what additional steps we should take to consolidate positive changes.
Energy Minister Nikolai Shulginov and Minister of Construction, Housing and Utilities Irek Faizullin will give more detailed reports on this issue.
The next issue – on additional support for the airline industry that continues having trouble due to the restrictions on flights to a number of regions in southern and central Russia. Overall, 11 cities are affected, including Rostov-on-Don, Krasnodar and Simferopol.
Today, we will allocate almost 2.5 billion rubles for partial compensation of costs sustained by the airports where civil flight maintenance has been temporarily suspended. Last year, we allocated about 7 billion roubles for the same purposes. This measure allowed us to keep highly qualified personnel. Changes in the number of employees has not exceeded even 10 percent anywhere.
This decision will make it possible to use subsidies, among other things, for paying interest on infrastructure loans. Hence, airports will be able to plan for further development.
Now let’s turn to a different issue. The Government continues to support museums throughout the country.
The President emphasised that Russia has unique collections that we rightly consider our national pride and assets for all of humanity.
Today, we will review a draft law that is supposed to preserve the integrity of museum collections.
All items and collections that play a major role in scientific, research and education activities without exception will be recognised as especially valuable movable property. Today, only the items in the main fund, included in the state catalogue, have this status.
Also, now liability claims against a museum cannot be levied against its collections. We hope these measures will enhance the legal protection of Russian museums and the country’s cultural legacy in general.
Colleagues, let’s start our discussion.
