The Council of Europe outlined further action plan for decentralization

This is a step-by-step instruction for communities to ensure a new quality in education, health care, administrative and social services, safe and comfortable life for our citizens. "Among the main points of the plan is the completion of the process of improving legislation on the merger and cooperation of territorial communities; sectoral decentralization and improving the quality of services, reforming the administrative and territorial structure; promoting gender equality," Hennadiy Zubko said.

Claudia Lucini, Director for Democratic Governance and Anti-Discrimination of the General Directorate-II for Democracy, noted that the Action Plan for Ukraine for 2018-2021 aims to help Ukraine implement key reforms. The main issue of the round table is discussion and development of a position on the legislative regulation of the issue of compliance with the law in the activities of local self-government bodies in Ukraine.

"By transferring resources, powers and opportunities to the local authorities, the central government should ensure the observance of the rights and freedoms of citizens in accordance with the Constitution. Therefore, we need to find a tool that can be named in different ways - administrative supervision, compliance monitoring, which, based on the principles of the European Charter of Local Self-Government and European legislation, will be the framework for strengthening cooperation between central and local authorities. And most importantly - a framework that will provide opportunities for the development of communities. Because the overall goal of both local government and central government is to improve the Ukrainian living standards, the introduction of quality services and the development of human potential. Therefore, we must find a common and compromise solution," Hennadiy Zubko noted.

He said that the Ministry of Regional Development in 2016 drafted a law on strengthening the responsibility of officials and local governments for making decisions that violate the Constitution and laws of Ukraine, which received a positive opinion from the Council of Europe.

George Milbradt, Special Envoy of the Government of Germany on decentralization in Ukraine, noted the positive results of the reform in Ukraine, the professionalism and responsibility of the Ministry of Regional Development in its implementation. He noted that the main task of today's discussion is to find a compromise between all the participants of the round table so that the reform of decentralization and local self-government will continue to be effective in the future.