Moscow News
http://www.mnweekly.ru/
May 30, 2008
Moral Imperative
By Marina Pustilnik
You know what makes Russia different from other countries? It's the fact that there is often a strong moral imperative woven into the fabric of everyday life. What do I mean by that? I mean that for long time Russians believed that the authorities must do something that is morally just for the people. I think it dates back to the years of the monarchy, when the Czar was seen as the father of his people, morally responsible for their souls. From that time on, the Russian authorities seem to have an urge to force people to do what is morally good.
Everyone remembers last year's news that persistent debt evaders would not be allowed to leave the country. When it was initiated, the measure mostly concerned persistent non-payers of bank credits. But it turns out that last year the court plaintiffs prevented as many as 15,000 citizens who had failed to make their child support payments from leaving the country, and in 2008 about 7,000 were stopped on the border over this. Apparently the measure worked well as "some of those stopped at the border were ready to fork over the cash on the spot".
Now the Russian plaintiffs want to take the matters further. On Tuesday, the Federal service of court plaintiffs announced that it wants to take serious measures against persistent non-payers of child support. According to the service's director Nikolai Vinnichenko, 10 million Russians have to make payments to their former families and each year the Federal service of court plaintiffs receives more than 1.5 million enforcement proceedings for forced collection of payments. The total debt in child support payments is 1 billion rubles. Since single mothers are one of the least socially protected categories of Russian citizens, the state now feels the moral imperative to try and protect them more, inventing measures that would force the delinquent fathers to pay up.
Among the measures proposed by the court plaintiffs are taking away non-payer's drivers licenses, mobile phones and travel tickets (with compensation). According to Vinnichenko, this would not violate citizens' constitutional right to free travel, because "if a person does not fulfill his civil obligations applied by the court, then his constitutional rights may be limited." In April, the plaintiff service signed an agreement with the Internal Ministry and the General Prosecutor's Office, which will engage in "non-criminal search for persistent non-payers" and transfer those found to the plaintiffs. But repressive measures are not the only ones that the state plans to use. The Federal service of court plaintiffs has signed an agreement with the state labor agency Rostrud that will find employment for persistent non-payers of child support who don't have a job. In reality their number is quite small - about 10 percent of the total number.
Like any morally good idea, this one is surely going to get mired in details. For one, there is no clear definition of the "persistent non-payer". Measures such as taking away mobile phones and driver's licenses are far from effective, since there is no problem with registering a mobile phone contract in somebody's name and driver's licenses - well, there's an option of taking a bus or hiring a driver, depending on the income of the non-payer. But even that is not the biggest problem. The biggest problem is in the heads. If people do not feel the moral imperative to support the children they sired and their mothers, the state cannot stuff this moral imperative down their throat. Stopped at the border or left without a ticket people will pay up, but when they come back they, it's unlikely that they will change their ways and start making timely payments every month. Finding work for the unemployed is good, but there needs to be a way to control that they pay the aliments from their new salaries. Here,
I have a suggestion: if you really want to make the delinquent fathers (and mothers) pay - why don't you pass legislation where by the employers have to set aside a certain part of their divorced employees' salaries for child support payments? A bit more paperwork, but at least this way the money will actually make it to the people who are supposed to get it.