The National Assembly voted on the Resolution on approving the state budget settlement.

Continuing the working program of the 3rd Session, on the morning of June 15, the National Assembly voted on the Resolution on approving the 2020 state budget settlement and discussed in the hall the draft Law on Petroleum (amended).

Photo: Doan Tan/VNA

The development of the Law on Petroleum (amended) aims to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of state management, remove barriers, create a favorable legal corridor for investors, and contribute to improving the attractiveness of the investment environment in the petroleum sector.

The draft Law on Petroleum (amended) submitted to the National Assembly for consideration and comments at this session consists of 11 chapters and 64 articles, inheriting the basic provisions of the current Law on Petroleum, ensuring the stability and continuity of signed petroleum contracts and agreements; ensuring compatibility and synchronization with the current legal system, international treaties to which Vietnam is a member and international petroleum industry practices.

The content of the draft Law addresses 6 groups of policies that have been submitted by the Government to the National Assembly for approval (Resolution No. 17/2021/QH15), including: Policy on supplementing and perfecting regulations related to petroleum contracts; Policy on regulating basic surveys on petroleum and the order and approval of steps for implementing petroleum activities and petroleum projects, including stages of oil and gas exploration and exploitation; Policy on regulating the framework for implementing petroleum projects in a chain from exploration, exploitation, transportation, and processing; Policy on investment incentives and special investment incentives for petroleum projects in oil and gas blocks through petroleum contracts; Policy on regulating accounting, auditing, settlement and handling of costs in petroleum activities; The policy stipulates the framework for allowing third parties to access available infrastructure of the oil and gas industry and the obligation to share oil and gas works and available infrastructure to make optimal and effective use of available infrastructure systems, avoiding waste in investment.

In the afternoon session, the National Assembly voted on the Law on Cinema (amended); the Law on Emulation and Commendation (amended) and discussed in the hall the draft Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law on Radio Frequencies.

According to the Government's Submission and the Verification Report of the National Assembly's Committee on Science, Technology and Environment, the viewpoint of amending the Law is to institutionalize the Party's Resolutions on comprehensively and synchronously perfecting the socialist-oriented market economic institutions, creating a favorable environment for mobilizing, allocating and effectively using radio frequencies and satellite orbits.

The Draft Law ensures consistency with relevant Laws and International Treaties, including adding 3 articles, amending 15 articles, adding, replacing, and abolishing a number of phrases in a number of articles to ensure consistency throughout the draft regulations on the following main contents: Group of issues on frequency band planning, licensing of radio frequency use and sanctions for violations; Group of issues on revenues from the use of radio frequencies; Group of issues on granting radio operator certificates; Group of issues on inspection and control of radio frequencies, handling of harmful interference, registration, international coordination on frequencies, satellite orbits and use of frequencies for defense and security purposes combined with socio-economic development; Group of issues on amending the authority to prescribe documents to be consistent with and consistent with relevant Laws; Group of issues on amending relevant Laws.