Cutting the costs of bureaucracy

The Prime Minister's Working Group on Administrative Reform has ordered ministries, People's Committees and Councils, Government agencies and State-owned enterprises to renew their effort to reduce their administrative costs by 30 per cent.

The group had identified 256 procedures at 18 ministries and six provinces and cities to be given priority for revision and abolition, said its chairman Government's Office Chief Nguyen Xuan Phuc.

If approved by Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung as part of the Government's Plan 30 for administrative reform, the streamlined procedures would help save more than VND6 trillion (US$55 million), he said.

The chairman said that up to 90 per cent of administrative procedures had been simplified.

But savings had been less than 10 per cent.

"The benefits could be much higher if we can devise effective measures to streamline more than 5,000 remaining procedures," said Phuc.

These would help people and enterprises and ensure management targets would be met.

The group identified the procedures required for building a house; paying taxes; clearing goods through customs; arranging a health check and registering a residence as the most troublesome.

Members of subordinate working groups charged with overseeing administrative reform agreed the proposed streamling was crucial but warned old-style management and egos would prove a hurdle to its introduction.

Finance Ministry Secretariat Chief Nguyen Duc Chi said that although the ministry continued issuing legal documents to simplify procedures, regulations introduced by other ministries and agencies added to them.

Labour, Invalids and Social Affairs Ministry working group chairman Dao Hong Lan said people seeking administrative reform must be very determined and not be deterred by other bureaucrats if they were to succeed.

Phuc said the group had invited the participation of social associations so as to better understand the aspirations of business and the people and to avoid any misuse of power.

The group would now seek the opinions of 50 lawyers as part of the second phase of Plan 30.

"We have also invited experts from Europe and South Korea to compare Viet Nam's administrative procedures with those of other countries," he said.

Results of Plan 30

The first phase of Plan 30 was completed with the establishment of a national database of administrative procedures last October.

It was the first time Viet Nam had put such procedures online and provided public access to 5,700 procedures and 100,000 forms.

The database enabled people to know clearly what administrative formalities they had to complete and at which agency, said Phuc.

The procedures and documents it provided would be regarded as originals from next year and applicants would be able to fill them out and print them.

The Finance Ministry says it has revised 145 procedures and abolished 32, creating a cost saving of VND2.1 trillion, (about $113.5 million).

It plans to revise 840 procedures by the end of the year.