Regretting that a good initiative has failed and seeking to contribute more effectively to the solutions that build preconditions for the economic growth, Lithuanian Free Market Institute (LFMI) announced about its withdrawal from the Sunrise Commission.
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An initiative for improving business conditions (known as the Sunrise) was started in Lithuania in 1999, which was designed to increase the efficiency of the government’s work and to round up the business community and specialists who would identify the sorest problems that inhibit business activities. LFMI joined the Sunrise movement from the very start, taking part in the activities of the Commission and its working groups. It should be admitted that the government and the parliament welcomed the proposals of the “first Sunrise” (during the Andrius Kubilius Administration); a number of them were immediately debated and adopted.
Eventually, the balance of decisions started taking an opposite direction. Proposals of the Sunrise Commission were modified, delayed or absolutely ignored, the working groups ceased to receive information and drafts of legal acts. Simultaneously, the government was taking decisions that apparently ran counter to the declared course of improving business climate. The Sunrise Commission became formal and ineffective. As a result, members of the working groups lost motivation to work and devote their time, and the business community, seeing no positive decisions, gave up on this initiative.
Below are some illustrative cases when proposals of the Sunrise Commission were not implemented or were perverted so that business conditions appeared to be aggravated rather than bettered.
Tax Working Group highlighted an inaccuracy in the Law on Tax Administration, which allowed the Tax Inspectorate to prolong the maximum inspection time of 90 days by another 20 days for drawing up a statement. When the working group proposed underlining in the Law that the inspection term of 90 days includes the time for drawing up a statement, the Sunrise Commission worked out a compromise – to fix a term of 100 days, including the time for making the statement. However, the draft amendments of the law submitted by the Ministry of Finance contained the term of 100 days but (!) the days for drawing up the statement of inspection were included only if the statement is made at the tax-payer’s place. Conspicuously, such formulation of the law under the flag of Sunrise discredits the idea of improving business conditions and the tool for achieving this goal.
LFMI proposed the Customs Working Group to improve the procedure of presenting and cancelling the status of credible business entity, so that all entities were given the credibility status a priori according to the presumption of innocence, and the conditions of non-credibility were related to the failing to execute the obligations to the customs. However, the proposal was not approved even within the working group itself, and, to the contrary, it was suggested to further extend the credibility levels and keep on asserting one’s credibility. This example shows that the working group dominated by state officials does not fulfil its mission to provide recommendations for improving business conditions.
Proposals of IT&T Working Group were not implemented at all motivating that either the indicated problem is not relevant for business or that the issue should be dealt with by another ministry, or misguidedly motivating that in order to draft the needed legal act, it is necessary to adopt additional legal acts in the first place.
Seeing the worsening situation, LFMI made repeated attempts to prove that the Sunrise initiative, if properly exploited, could bring an impressive array of positive results. LFMI submitted a number of proposals on how to accelerate the implementation of the decisions of the Sunrise Commission, how to ensure that the adopted legal acts are not in conflict with the ideas of the Sunrise. Sadly, attempts to animate the Sunrise movement failed because of an evident lack of political will to enhance business conditions.
Realising that attempts to revive the Sunrise have failed, that political will to implement the program for improving business conditions is insufficient, that members of the working groups are isolated from information and that the proposed solutions are distorted or ignored, LFMI thinks that work in the Sunrise Commission has became utterly ineffective. Regretting that a good initiative has failed and seeking to contribute more effectively to the solutions, which create preconditions for the economic growth, LFMI withdraws from the activities of the Sunrise Commission.
Even so, LFMI will not keep away but will search for more effective methods to improve the law-making process that would allow improving the business environment, creating new jobs and increasing personal income. LFMI believes that the current law-making process is not suitable for Lithuanian citizens and the society to express their opinion and does not correspond to the traditions of the European Union which intends to involve its citizens into the law-making process and adopt decisions openly and publicly.
