On 4 September the Saeima will commence its autumn session of 2012, which entails convening regular plenary sittings, elaborating draft laws and scrutinising the work of the government.
Currently there are 150 draft laws under consideration by the parliament, including several drafts of new laws. For instance, the new Construction Law, which will improve the public consultation and builders’ certification procedures, as well as the Election Campaign Law, which will introduce a uniform regulation of the election campaigning and supervision thereof, thus bringing provisions of several laws under a single legislative act. The parliament is also working on new provisions regarding an out-of-court debt recovery procedure that will require licensing of debt recovery service providers and protection of natural persons from aggressive debt recovery practices.
Solvita Āboltiņa, Speaker of the Saeima, pointed out that in the beginning of this session the parliament, among other urgent issues, will focus on amendments to the state budget for 2012. Equally difficult decisions will have to be made regarding the budget for 2013. “Last year Latvia’s economy grew faster than expected and reached 5.5 percent. Besides, in the first quarter of this year, its GDP growth was the highest in the European Union. On the one hand, it gives grounds for optimism in the future. On the other hand, the situation is not improving rapidly enough to warrant excessive optimism and to discontinue the cautious approach we have been practicing in recent years,” said the Speaker.
Solvita Āboltiņa indicates that another highlight of this autumn session will be the work on amendments to the Citizenship Law, something that is eagerly anticipated by the Latvian expatriate communities. The amendments will provide for dual citizenship and will solve numerous other problems that have become pressing since the last amendments introduced in 1998.
The Speaker also highlighted the important task of debating and adopting the National Development Plan, as well as draft laws aimed at strengthening the rule of law and streamlining the work of the judiciary.
As a part of the open parliament policy, the work on community engagement will be continued throughout the autumn session; for instance, on 28 September the Saeima will hold the traditional Open Door Day. This year the event will consist not only of guided tours of the main building of the Saeima and a quiz on the parliament, but also an exchange of ideas facilitated by the web-based platforms manabalss.lv and gudrasgalvas.lv on efficient monitoring of the MPs’ work and participation in the legislative process.
The Saeima will continue to provide a platform for discussions on strategic development of Latvia, said Āboltiņa. It is also planned to congratulate the members of the Latvian Olympic Team early in the autumn session, as well as to launch the programme “Meet the Saeima”, as a part of which the Saeima staff members will visit schools and provide schoolchildren with opportunities to learn more about the legislative work in a parliamentary democracy.
The Rules of Procedure of the Saeima provide for both regular and extraordinary sessions. In the course of one year, there are three regular sessions of the Saeima – autumn, winter and spring sessions. The sessions are convened by the Presidium. The Saeima decides on opening and closing dates of the regular sessions. In 2012 the spring session was closed on 21 June.
Saeima Press Service