Moscow Mayoral Candidates’ Debate, Round 3

You are watching the TV channel

Moscow 24

Debate. Host: Dmitry

Shugorev. Good evening, dear

viewers. So, the debate on the channel

Moscow 24, the third and final installment. In

our previous broadcasts, we had a thorough

discussion—I mean the last one in particular—

as thoroughly as time allowed,

about transportation. But what about,

our voters may ask, the other issues

such as housing and utilities, the environment, illegal

migration, and social policy? Today

we will try to fill that gap as well. Let me

remind you that in the studio with us today are

Yabloko party representative Sergei

Mitrokhin—good evening; Ivan Melnikov from

the Communist Party of the Russian Federation; Nikolai Levichev from A Just

Russia; Mikhail Dektaryov from the LDPR; and Alexei

Navalny from RPR-PARNAS. Good evening. Right

from the start, we will begin with

the issue of housing and utilities, and so, in the order

determined by the draw, I will ask

Sergei Mitrokhin first, if I may. Sergei

Sergeyevich,

in your platform, you state

that everything will be decided by referendum,

including the issues that concern

everyone in the housing and utilities sector. The number

of signatures required to call a referendum

would be reduced from 2% of voters to 0.5%. But what about

the remaining 98–99% of citizens? Please, you have

one minute. Well, you know, you are somewhat

a little

First, we need to ensure transparency in monopoly tariffs,

above all those

that were just privatized—MOEK

and Vodokanal. Look, if you take

a long period of time, the growth

in tariffs has outpaced inflation by 10 times or more.

That means these companies are

fraudulent. They are fleecing us, they

build in

such markups

into the cost of their services. Therefore,

the first thing I will do is conduct an audit of all

these companies and secure the removal of their

managers, and bring to trial those

who have stolen. I will ensure a review

of tariffs and guarantee full transparency.

They will all publish their

information on their official websites

on the internet. Then tariffs can be

reduced. As for referendums on housing and utilities, I

do not have that in my platform.

Excuse me. Ivan, please tell us,

again quoting your platform: one of

the first steps of our team will be a ban

on raising tariffs; their level will be

approved by the Moscow City Duma. You are sometimes

criticized for this as a return to

the Soviet era. They say that now we have a market

economy, that this will not work. What

would you say to your critics? I would answer

very simply: it is absolutely obvious, and

all specialists say so, that right now

roughly 70% of the existing tariffs

consist of kickbacks. Therefore, the first thing

to do is

to freeze the current tariffs and разобраться generally

in the tariff-setting system. I believe that

the system is opaque, that the system

is deliberately convoluted so that citizens cannot

make sense of it. The quality of the

services being provided is appalling.

Moreover, I believe that in the housing and utilities system

we need to introduce such rules as, first, I

believe that for all pensioners living alone

housing and utility charges should be abolished. And furthermore,

for pensioners over the age of 65, housing and utility costs

even the current Moscow budget can

cover this. And if industry starts working again,

as set out in my platform,

the budget will receive even more revenue,

and the Moscow budget will have

such opportunities. Thank you.

Vladimirovich, if I may, also a quote

from your election platform:

tariff increases... you propose fighting...

through the removal of intermediary companies... You

say they are rising by more than 10%,

quite rightly. But how do you

intend to fight all this

not while working in the Russian government,

but in the post of

mayor? Thank you for the question. First of all,

taking advantage of this last

unique opportunity, I would like to address

the voters of the city of Moscow and offer them

our apologies for the fact that, thanks to

the Moscow government, which is the

owner of the Media Moscow holding company and,

accordingly, of this TV channel, we all

find ourselves in an environment

resembling KVN (a popular Russian comedy competition show). As is well known, in KVN, in

30 seconds you can make one joke; here

we can joke twice in one minute.

Let us assume that in the first 30 seconds I

made my first joke. My second joke is this: all

voters and residents of Moscow, on Monday at

every metro station, will be able to get my

campaign newspaper, where above all

attention will be drawn to the fact that

the Moscow government is collecting

for electricity usage—70 watts per

hour per month for one household. There you will find

how we intend to fight this.

Thank you, Mikhail Vladimirovich. A question for you

also on the subject of tariffs: freezing

tariffs until the results

of an independent audit are obtained—what exactly

are you aiming for? And how long should people wait?

A month? Three? I will begin by calling on

all my supporters, all supporters

of LDPR candidates for local self-government bodies

—as you know, elections are underway—to come to

the rally on August 22 at Bolotnaya Square at

12:00 noon. Next, I will say that we are going

as a single team, and 15 candidates for

local self-government deputies in New

Moscow were not allowed to run in the elections from the LDPR, and I

want to say this: I look at my

colleagues, and for two rounds already you’ve been pulling your punches

Let’s unite and demand the resignation

of the head

of the housing and utilities sector. By freezing it for all 5 years, we

believe that an audit will show that, in reality, in the

tariff, the actual cost is significantly lower

and the rest is markups and

administrative expenses. We will bring tariffs down altogether

reduce them, and the economy will function perfectly well

we will cut administrative costs and remove

all intermediaries from the market; the state

itself will return to the housing and utilities market. That I

guarantee. It was his... Alexei, we’re joking

we’re joking, Alexei Anatolyevich. I have a

question for you. We’ve heard a lot about how

you—how you

criticize; we’ve heard a lot about apartments

we’ve heard a lot about the embezzlement that

the information is well-founded, and all my criticism

is quite well-founded. Still, let’s

wait until this information is actually

verified. I wanted to ask you this:

imagine that on September 9, you

wake up as the Mayor of Moscow. You come

to work, and on your desk

there is this huge folder

of documents, and written on it is not—not

about how much property someone has, where, or who owns what

real estate, but simply

“Preparation for Winter.” Do you have

an understanding, for example, of how you would prepare

for winter? That’s the kind of thing voters

want to know. You know, in this situation, for me there is

nothing new. Every day when I

come to work at my Anti-Corruption Foundation

(an anti-corruption NGO), in front of me lies exactly the same

thick folder of documents that I

work with. Unfortunately, this folder of documents

really is very thick because

the Anti-Corruption Foundation has plenty to

work on. There will be less corruption when

I become mayor; then in such a foundation there will be

fewer folders of documents lying around

Preparation for winter in Moscow will proceed

according to plan. But when I speak about

housing and utilities, I must recall an important point

in my program, which says that

one of my first decisions will be

to cancel Sergei

Sobyanin’s unlawful decision to raise tariffs from August 1

Muscovites, and I as an ordinary Muscovite, we

must understand what we are paying for now

the tariff is unfounded; all these figures

are made up. Tariffs should be set so that we can see

what we are paying for. Right now, when we pay

for electricity and heating, we are also paying, among other things,

for a donation to United Russia from

Mosenergo of 300 million rubles (about 300 million RUB). So when we

throw out all the unjustified price tags and all

the unjustified amounts, the tariff will drop seriously

It will be interesting if you become mayor

to hear you then, when you

have to raise tariffs afterward. You will have

that opportunity. When I become mayor,

your TV company will be under my authority, and I

right now in Moscow the increase, the increase

is smaller than across Russia as a whole. Well, that’s the

reference. It only seems that way to you—the increase

Sergei Sergeyevich, please ask your

question. We’re going clockwise, clockwise

Ivan Ivanovich, please, your question

What will it be?

Ivan

Ivanovich, doesn’t it seem to you that today

the entire system

of housing and utilities in the city of Moscow is a system of one

grand fraud? For example, I

managed, through the courts,

to have

the meter servicing scheme—whatever that even was—

struck down, but they were skimming off 6 billion a year. And

what measures do you propose in order to

punish them?

So, the first thing I would like to note is that we

have been fighting for several months for the

possibility of holding a referendum in

Moscow on the issue

of freezing housing and utilities tariffs and, in the end,

figuring out what exactly these

tariffs consist of and why they are so high. We

went all the way to the Supreme Court, and the Supreme Court

supported us, but the Moscow City

Election Commission still does not

want to comply with the Supreme Court’s ruling

and schedule the referendum. I

believe that the referendum will definitely

take place, and we will keep pushing for it

so that we can...

As for how you will fight

fraud, because this sphere

has a huge

number

of frauds, but unfortunately

there is fraud in all spheres, and in order to

fight fraudsters, we need to change

the entire system of governance in Moscow. Thank you

and ask your question to Nikolai

Vladimirovich, please

On the topic of ecology, or on any topic?

Preferably on the topic of housing and utilities, of course. Well

what is unclear to you?

Understood. Nikolai Vladimirovich, please tell us

in your view, what needs

to be done in the housing and utilities system so that citizens

are convinced that the tariffs really

correspond to the services they

receive? Thank you for the question, Ivan Ivanovich

Whatever we do now in this area,

citizens will only become more convinced that

the tariffs are inflated and not justified by anything

since in Moscow there are around 400

management companies, and in a whole number of

districts of Moscow, monopolization of this sphere

has reached such proportions that a single

management companies handling 500 buildings each

manage them

and residents have no leverage over these

management companies, effectively none.

Residents need to be able to choose for themselves

which management company they want. In my

building, for example, there was a situation where

we wanted to replace the company that suits us

with one that actually meets our needs

or whatever it is called now. So

without

creating a competitive environment

here and stripping this sector of its monopoly

and corruption, we still won't

achieve anything. Nikolai Vladimirovich, last time you

criticized us simply because

we stayed on live air for too long.

Let me remind everyone once again that this time we have

exactly

one hour.

And Mikhail Vladimirovich, you have been living in

Moscow for several years now. Please tell us

how you pay for water, electricity,

gas, and what you do when

you receive figures that differ from those

from the previous month. We go and

pay, just as all our

fellow citizens do. Because people

are used to paying for what they consume. And

as for the increases you mentioned,

yes, since August. Look: there has been an increase in

gas, there has been an increase in electricity,

there has been an increase in water, there has been an increase in

heating, and we consider this

unjustified. And I do not understand at all

why Mr. Sobyanin decided to run for

mayor against the backdrop of a two-stage tariff increase.

From a political point of view, in

any country this would be suicide. And

to everyone who

considers unjustified

the bills issued by the DEZ (district maintenance offices) and

management companies, I can recommend only one thing:

contact our

LDPR (Liberal Democratic Party of Russia) public reception offices. Here is my program—

you can get it at every metro station—and

our lawyers will tell you how to properly

file a complaint. Sometimes it is not even necessary

to go to court to force

these scoundrels who fleece

all Muscovites. Do you want to ask

Alexei Navalny anything? You have 30

seconds. Mine is very simple, Alexei.

Well, I have long wanted to know: were you given

signatures by United Russia deputies during

the process of passing the

municipal filter, you put out materials by your

supporters without publication details,

and no one removes you from the race. From this we

draw the conclusion that you have some kind of

special immunity. The question is: how do you feel about

the idea of

letting foreigners into the housing and utilities market, or, if elected, will you

if elected, how

will you, on instructions from the Kremlin, which apparently

oversees you, still raise them? This is a question from

the housing and utilities sphere, please: will you raise them

or not? Will you let Americans in?

Please answer. Alexei, first of all, as for

my right to participate in

the election campaign and my right

to send campaigners onto the streets of Moscow,

despite the fact that the police

obstruct us, even Moscow City Hall does not

dispute and does not try to dispute

my right to take part in the campaign. This is

no special immunity. Look at

my rating.

Excuse me.

You are counting on falsification, not on

victory. He does not dare remove me from

the election because he understands that they will be

absolutely

legitimate. Right now we are not talking about

some mythical puppet masters.

Look at what is happening now: Gazprom is

monopolizing it.

What matters is that I, as mayor, would destroy this

monopoly, and Muscovites would pay for housing and utilities

what they actually cost. Thank you, thank you.

That was the topic of housing and utilities. We are now moving on to

another topic that is also important for our

voters: it is

the environment. Sergei Sergeyevich, once again

[text truncated]

the amount has been reduced thanks to new technologies

for purification. What is wrong with current purification technologies?

What do you not like about them? You know, even according to

official reports—we study

the work of the water utility—even according to official

reports, many samples contain a large number of

harmful substances. That means the purification technologies

being used are insufficient. There are

different methods: ionization, silver treatment. Our

specialists know about this. But in general,

pollution in Moscow is a terrible thing

because it means

a rise in cancer rates, a rise in other

diseases, which, incidentally, occurred during

Sobyanin's time in office, although on

television he claims the opposite. It seems

the first signal came when the Yabloko party

together with residents of Pechatniki achieved

the shutdown of a cement elevator terminal.

Mikha, don't lie.

There, on the site of the closed cement

elevator, they want to build a waste incineration

plant, although long ago we managed

to stop that program because

it causes very severe air pollution.

Instead of incineration, we need to focus on

waste recycling. Ivan Ivanovich, again

a question from your program: you talk

about environmental police units. But

what powers would they have? Right now there are

environmental patrols—how would this

be different? After all, these are not

law enforcement bodies. Yes, I will now

I'll answer, but first a few words about the previous

question. Right now in Moscow they use

chlorination technology. It is a very

outdated technology from many years ago,

from the time when plague and cholera

were rampant. It produces carcinogenic substances.

That is why Moscow has extremely high

rates of cancer; they are much

higher than in many other regions

of Russia. Therefore, we need to switch to

modern technologies, which all of

Europe has already adopted, such as ultrafiltration.

Now, as for the eco-

police: this is an official division

of the police that will monitor

compliance with legislation in the field

of environmental safety. The situation here

is extremely serious, and the main

reason is that anti-...

... [inaudible / unclear fragment]

Could Alexei Navalny be asked

a question for Sergei Sergeyevich about housing and utilities?

Please, you have 30 seconds. Excuse me,

forgive me, Sergei Sergeyevich. Please tell us,

in Moscow's system of

homeowners' associations (TSZh) there are simply a huge number

of falsifications of the very fact that these TSZh were created.

There are honest, normal TSZh that

work, but there are buildings where things were simply

falsified, and money for major repairs

was involved. What should be done with such buildings? Well, you

know, this is a very serious issue. I have

worked on it. Who organized all these

falsifications in the first place? A structure of the Moscow city government

called the GUIS (state engineering services body) was behind them.

There was an absurd situation where one employee

of the GUIS headed 30 TSZh at once. But there was

a loophole in the Housing Code that

allowed this, because it did not

require all participants in the meeting to...

There are many such loopholes today, both in

federal laws, which, incidentally,

many State Duma factions vote for. There is a huge

number of them, and they open the door to

theft and fraud through TSZh.

For example, fraudsters appropriate property

that belongs to all owners jointly. Therefore,

it is necessary to cleanse the legislation of

such corrupt provisions, and

those

fraudsters who created fake

TSZh must definitely be punished. The Moscow city government is not dealing with this issue today,

but if I become mayor,

I will definitely deal with this

issue. By the way, all contracts with

management companies are now

being revised; that is also in the news.

You know, contracts are being revised with

management companies, but again, no one is

educating Muscovites about

how they should fight this. Nadezhda...

Let's return, let's return to the topic of ecology,

because Nikolai Vladimirovich needs

to be asked a question. Incidentally, he is the only candidate

who has a line in his

program about

waste-processing plants.

This is an important issue, together with the Moscow Region (the area surrounding Moscow).

Why do you think... How

do you think, why did your

predecessors fail to do it? Because

for as long as I can remember, I have been hearing these

talks about waste-processing

plants. So why, why do you think

you will succeed? Because I am counting on

the fact that I

will win the Moscow mayoral election. My comrade

from the Social Democratic Party

... [unclear fragment]

and then we will be able to implement the program

that our party has long prepared,

which was presented back in the day to Sergei

Kuzhugetovich

Shoigu.

The problem cannot be solved in Moscow and the Moscow Region separately. In Moscow

5 million tons are generated annually,

and only 2% is sorted and recycled, whereas in

the European Union

the figure is 70%. This is a complex problem. In the 11

seconds I have left, of course I cannot

solve it. But I can make a joke in 5 seconds:

Citizens, there will be no garbage in Moscow if I

become... What kind of joke is that, really?

Mikhail Vladimirovich, again, a question for

you. By the way, you made a very

interesting statement: make Moscow

the largest recreational zone in Mos...

It's elementary. We have 120 km of waterfront in

Moscow. Moscow is, in general, a resort city, but

just look at the Moscow River—you can see all of this.

At present, even breathing is harmful. I explain: we

the first thing I will do after

being elected is announce a tender to clean up the Moscow River. All

the embankments will be fragrant, all of them

will be adapted so that

Muscovites can relax there. There will be free

Wi-Fi everywhere. And on Sparrow Hills we will create

the largest beach in Europe, free of charge, with

river sand, as it was in the 1970s.

And as for ecology, look

at what is happening now: bicycle transport is being developed

under the current

environmental conditions, instead of

developing it in parks, in

recreational zones, and building new parks.

The current authorities are throwing the most active

Muscovites under the wheels, forcing them to breathe

exhaust fumes. Ask any pulmonologist:

in 5 years this will cause delayed harm

to health. You cannot ride a bicycle

around the city today in the current conditions. I agree, but

I love riding a bicycle, I do, but

with a helmet on, not like...

And Alexei Anatolyevich, I also have a question for you about

bodies of water. You know, of the 64

ponds in Moscow, only a few are suitable for swimming.

By the way, tomorrow we...

... how can all of this be changed, in general?

if you want to be able to swim everywhere,

if you want to swim everywhere, then unfortunately

Moscow right now is not the kind of city where

you should live, sadly. And I also want

to be able to swim everywhere. I’m someone who lives

in southeastern Moscow, and if we’re already

talking about environmental problems, then I

can simply say that my family and I,

when we walk in the only nearby

park, the view I see is

the smokestack of the Moscow oil refinery,

whose emissions I have been breathing for 17 years.

And for 17 years I’ve been told that

in fact these emissions do not exceed—

that they are within the maximum permissible limits.

The same thing is happening with bodies of water,

the same thing is happening with elections, with

emissions. Law and order are the main things

needed for the

environmental situation to improve. If into Moscow’s

ponds, where you want to swim, they keep

dumping all that filth from auto repair shops,

car washes, and all those small businesses

located around them, which

dump it illegally while paying a small

bribe to the local

authorities.

That’s it, thank you, thank you. A slip of the tongue, Fred—

that was interesting. Thank you, Sergei.

Sergeyevich, please ask your question

to your neighbor, Ivan Ivanovich. Well, you know

that the Yabloko party is actively engaged in

protecting parks and green

spaces, and stopping infill development during which

those very green areas are cut down.

And your party has often

taken part in our campaigns; sometimes we

even joined forces. For example, in order

to prevent the construction of

waste incineration plants. So tell me,

have you ever seen at these rallies

the LDPR party, which lies that it

stopped the cement terminal in Pechatniki?

Three rallies— just a minute, Pechatniki, Mitino—

you run around courtyards. I personally saw one

time at a rally in Mitino. Beyond that, I have never

seen representatives of your faction.

That’s not true. There was recently a rally; we

did not go nowhere—

we were there. Stop this

about the LDPR. I want to say that indeed

the situation with this is very complicated. The fact is

that in Moscow, about

100,000 trees are cut down every year. In place of these

felled trees, they plant little shrubs.

Of course, this does not improve the environmental situation;

not only does it not get better, it

gets worse every year. The state of

the air in Moscow is terrible;

it exceeds

permissible limits by a factor of 10. I believe that those projects

that are now connected with the expansion of

major roads, the construction of parallel routes, when

public gardens are cut down,

entire park areas are cut down, and

roads are laid along residential buildings,

are extremely harmful to the environment

in Moscow. What question would you ask

the representative— the Communists were talking with

Yabloko. Oh, well then, Nikolai

Vladimirovich, I already said

the state of the air is perhaps worse than in

Moscow. And if you take even the industrial

cities of the Urals, the air there has become cleaner than in

Moscow. So what do you see as the reasons for the

terrible environmental situation

that has developed in our city?

I’m not even talking about those countries where

the environment has long been carefully

monitored. Is this happening because

the legislation and enforcement practice are not

demanding enough when it comes to

introducing modern

treatment

procedures in those industrial zones

that remain within Moscow and

for some reason still have not been moved outside

the city limits? But the main thing I

would like to promise Muscovites, without waiting

for the moment when I become mayor of Moscow,

is that on August 29 I am going to present,

together with the public organization

Green Patrol, a project to create

an interactive environmental map of Moscow

so that every resident can see

where they live, which harmful

substances are present in high amounts, and what they can do

to truly preserve their

health—or whether they need to get out of there, and

where they can go for a swim. Please ask

your question. Dear Mikhail

Vladimirovich, it seems you are already

trying to prove that you are a grown-up

boy, and it is not nice to interrupt adults. I

am once again giving you a friendly reprimand.

And my question is this: it is clear that

waste disposal is impossible without

separately collecting different fractions

of waste. So, do you think the Russian

soul is capable of, with German

thoroughness, sorting different fractions

of garbage for subsequent collection and

recycling? An interesting question— here you go.

Socialists. So he has already insulted

the Russian person. The Russian person is the most

capable: he can build rockets and

build giant megacities

that are the best, the most comfortable, like Moscow. He

can sort garbage separately too. I’ll let you in

on a terrible secret: in Moscow we already

have a separate waste collection program in operation.

It’s a pilot program and it needs to be expanded. And regarding

waste processing plants, you can

build them anywhere; the main thing is

to build them using new technologies and taking into account

the opinions of the residents who live nearby,

because these voluntaristic

decisions, not only in Moscow but also in the Moscow region,

but also in other regions, when no one is

asked, land is seized and they begin

putting up these monstrous structures

and as for who should work at

waste-sorting plants, they should be staffed by

those migrants who

are currently being held in temporary detention

centers, put to useful work. There, that solves

the issue of illegal migration.

Please, ask your question, Alexei.

Well, look, we know about your sentence in the

Kirovles case, which seems to be connected with

environmental issues. I won’t talk about ecology—I approached it

from a distance. I won’t talk about justice or

injustice. It’s entirely possible that you filed

an appeal and may even be acquitted

or perhaps even

something else. I want to ask: there are few forests in Moscow,

so why are you running for mayor of Moscow, and if

you lose, would you be willing to work for one of the

winners as head of

the department for Samara’s parks and

recreation areas? Listen, Mikhail, I

first of all would like to say that I am terribly

glad that you are a candidate for mayor of Moscow, because

without you, our debates would, well, have been

far less sparkling. You

said, as I understand it, that you are still heading back to

Samara, where you will head

some kind of department there. If I were

elected, I might even

invite you.

We joked around a little, and Muscovites

have seen our, your cheerful jokes, but

now they still want to hear my

view on the problem of Moscow’s forests,

Moscow’s forest parks. What is happening

right now, when the so-called

“clarification” of the boundaries of nature

reserves is used as a pretext to carve off

pieces of parks, is completely unacceptable.

Look at what is happening to Bitsevsky

Park. Look at what is happening to

it in bits and pieces, and all sorts of

suspicious holiday resorts appear,

suspicious hotels,

administrative buildings, houses, and so

on. If I become mayor, I will absolutely and

unequivocally ban forever the practice of

“clarifying” park boundaries in such a way

that they become smaller. Then again,

if I’m not mistaken, in Moscow recently

how many trees have

been planted?

Fifty...

Your time is up now, your time is up, Alexei.

Navalny, I’ll ask your question myself.

Sergei Sergeyevich will tell you about all

these falsifications. Sergei

Sergeyevich, Sobyanin’s government is very

fond of telling us that they

plant new trees. Everywhere they

cut down a piece of a park in order to

build a residential building, they slap up

a sign saying there will be compensatory

landscaping somewhere 8 km (about 5 miles) away. What do you

think about that? Is this

simply brazen deception and falsification

on the part of Sobyanin’s city administration, or not? You

know,

today the Moscow government really

does not like specially protected natural

areas. For example, they attached

Vorobyovy Gory (Sparrow Hills) to Gorky Park, but these are

completely different parks. Vorobyovy Gory

is a nature reserve; birds nest there. It should be

managed by conservation specialists,

not entertainment managers. And what will happen

there in Losiny Ostrov (Elk Island)?

They are not shrinking it—it is a national park—

but go in from the side of Bogorodsky

Bridge: they are stripping away the topsoil,

the natural layer that is hundreds, even thousands, of years old, and

laying rolled turf. This is simply

a crime. This is happening in all

parks—they have paved everything over with Sobyanin’s

tiles. Yesterday it was Losiny Ostrov, before that Ostankino,

where I managed to secure the

demolition of an illegal structure, including bathhouses

for officials from the housing and utilities department. Yesterday I

visited the ruins. But this outrage

continues: illegal construction,

parking lots in the same Losiny Ostrov,

illegal brothels—they cannot be

legal—illegal restaurants, all of this

continues in Losiny Ostrov. Yes, they cannot,

but they do exist in Losiny Ostrov, and in

that bathhouse that I

had demolished. You’re destroying Moscow, Sergei.

I’m not destroying Moscow.

Mikha...

Come on, come on. Sergei Sergeyevich, I have a

question for you now regarding

regarding

migration. Again, in your program

you write that jobs

currently occupied by migrants can realistically be replaced

with local Moscow workers. To do this,

it is necessary, in particular, to bring back to work

retired specialists. A very sensible

idea. But where will you find so many

retired specialists? You know, Moscow is

a very educated city. We have the Academy of Sciences,

which, thank God, has not yet

been shut down, and we will fight to ensure

that it is not shut down. I believe that

retirees who work in housing and utilities should

keep their Moscow pension supplement.

Working retirees in

fields that are important for Moscow should be paid

an additional supplement. That is the first point. Second, cheap

migrant labor means a decline in

labor productivity. In place of 100

migrants, two Muscovites can, using

modern equipment—the same

for example, a paving machine—do

100 times more than this enormous mass of cheap

quasi-slave labor. Right now, we are seeing a decline in

labor productivity because

our state encourages cheap labor

just like in Ancient Rome, which in the end

collapsed because of it, you see. That

is, if we reduce illegal

migration, it won’t just mean that Muscovites will

work — they will work using

modern equipment, and we will move

toward a 21st-century economy rather than

remaining stuck in the old economy. Thank you, thank you. Ivan,

I also have a question about your quote:

“by sharply reducing the number of migrants,”

“while preserving labor market stability, we, together with

representatives of ethnic diasporas,

will develop an action plan for

normalizing interethnic relations

especially among young people.” So, after

strict quotas are introduced and after

someone is deported from the country,

there will be something to talk about. Will that be a simple

conversation, or not such a simple one? Well, I’ll start

by saying that today’s Moscow

officials benefit from having millions of

illegal migrants as cheap

labor and siphoning off

fabulous profits from it. I want to say that

our faction has already introduced bills under

which, first, um, for

hiring migrants, employers will

have to pay much larger contributions into various social

funds, um, much larger deductions than

for hiring citizens of the Russian

Federation. Second, I introduced a bill on

the mandatory introduction of a work visa for

all migrants who are hired for

jobs. Interethnic dialogue, you know,

is always difficult. But I

believe that when the atmosphere

in the city of Moscow normalizes, when instead of more than

2 million there are 200,000 left, this

dialogue can be established, and it will be very

productive. Thank you. Another question on the topic:

a very sensitive issue. More than 50% of Muscovites

— this is a quote from your program —

believe that newcomers are trying

to make Muscovites live by their own

rules. In this line, did you mean

people who came from

the near and far abroad, or

our own fellow citizens who came from

Russia? Both

and the others. I can

answer. Since the question is about migration

issues, I want to say that

of course this problem cannot be solved with a magic wand

in one

stroke. So we need to move

gradually. To begin with, I propose

looking reality in the face and

determining how many migrants are not

the city quota of 186,000, but how many

migrants working today

are working in places where tomorrow we will not be able

to do without them, and setting such a

quota — let it be 800,000, maybe a million, I don’t

know — yes, in order to eliminate this

aspect of their presence. Because those

poor Vietnamese people who are being herded into this

ghetto — they didn’t come on their own; they were

brought here by their own mafia, which has teamed up

with our Russian and Moscow mafia

and for some reason none of the officials wants to

answer for that. Thank you. By the way, we have

already been working for more than x hours

this week in total, so again, returning

to the conversation about that — Dmitry, I’ve just come from

Golyanovo

a temporary detention camp

Well then, tell us about that, and

also tell

us: you are proposing a ban on the employment of

foreign citizens throughout the entire retail

trade sector — we heard, in the entire sphere of

consumer services. We have just heard from your

opponents that they can somehow

somehow

be redirected to other work. You yourself

proposed incineration

plants, those who are temporarily, temporarily, who are

being held temporarily. I was in Golyanovo — there were

450 Koreans there alone. They do nothing, they

lie on beds, and the Emergency Situations Ministry feeds them

buckwheat porridge with canned meat. Well, excuse me,

pensioners, the homeless, and children are not

fed like that in schools, yet there

they have washing machines there — they’re living like at a resort. Everyone

wants to go home, so I suggested: let them

work, while they are doing nothing, in

public, at least somewhat useful

jobs. In general, regarding migrants, we

say only one thing: we do not need a single

migrant, legal or illegal, here in Moscow.

Muscovites want to work, from route taxis

to those same garment factories. We have

people from the Moscow region and from

nearby regions who want to work. We do not need them at all.

We will drive them all out by 2015

and close Moscow to all legal

and illegal migrants. This quota system, when

some quota is announced and they

keep coming in and coming in and coming in — it’s corruption, and

we will jail everyone who organizes illegal

migration, and send them home along with them. About 3,000

have already been expelled, by the way. And regarding

Vietnam, interestingly, the embassy found

the embassy found 200 passports there, which speaks

quite clearly, as does the involvement of a local official.

And I will quote your program again:

“the inadmissibility of illegal migrant labor in

municipal services; otherwise, fines and

termination of contracts.” This is exactly

what we are all advocating now, and it is what

we are in fact doing now. There are

fines, and there are contract terminations.

Nothing of the sort. Let me first give

a general outline of my

anti-migrant policy, which is called the toughest among

all the candidates. That is probably

That is indeed the case; it is a tough measure, but nevertheless

it is based on the law. The first thing

I am talking about, and that I will push for,

is the introduction of a visa regime

at long last with the countries of Central Asia and

the South Caucasus. Here, colleagues, I will pursue this

at the federal level, and I find it ridiculous

when deputies here say that

they are going to shut something down when they cannot even

do that—the president already...

That is a distortion. The second thing I am

saying is that we will disqualify and

terminate contracts with those who hire

undocumented migrants. Right now, that is not happening.

Please: you go out, win a tender,

hire 50 citizens of Uzbekistan

illegally, and no one will take the contract away from you.

And third, within a year we will

ban state-funded public

organizations that work with

municipal money from hiring, with those funds,

foreign nationals. These three measures will work and

will seriously reduce both the number

of migrants and the number of crimes

associated with them. Thank you, thank you.

Sergei Sergeyevich, it is time to ask—how...

A question for me? Right now we are—we are asking

a question now. I was asking a question just now,

a question to him.

Now, please, go ahead and ask your question.

A question—a question from Navalny (Alexei Navalny) will follow

afterward. Please, on this topic, we have already

agreed: ask each other

questions. That is correct—the moderator has just asked

each question.

Listen, we have sorted it out. Sergei Sergeyevich,

please ask Ivan Ivanovich a question about

migration—or Navalny (Alexei Navalny), Ivan

Ivanovich. Well, for you. It seems to me that here

just now there was a certain

populism in saying that the main

culprits are these migrants. Do you not

think that the main

culprits behind migration are the Moscow city government

which allows them to work in

the housing and utilities sector?

That is exactly what I was talking about—I already

said: not only in the housing and utilities sector, but also in

construction and in other areas of business.

Of course it benefits Moscow officials

—I want to say once again—to have millions of

undocumented migrants, use them

as cheap labor, and derive from this

fabulous profits that go into

their pockets. Alexei, I want

to say that the relevant bill

on introducing a visa regime has been sitting for months in

the State Duma. I very much hope that

this—Ivan Ivanovich, well, it speaks

about work visas, just as your program does.

That bill is in the Moscow City Duma,

whereas I am talking about

the bill that is currently in

the State Duma. I hope that

other factions will support it. You know

that our border troops were abolished in this country,

that there is essentially no one to check visas.

Well, please—the border service

does the checking.

Around Moscow there are approximately 3.5

million Russian citizens—in Moscow and the nearest

Moscow region—who want to get

jobs in Moscow, in the construction

business and as drivers, but they do not have that

opportunity. Moscow

officials do not let them in because they make

less profit off them.

Therefore, the introduction of this law will make it possible

to regulate this situation. A question

for Nikolai Vladimirovich. Please ask it.

And there are 9 seconds left for it. Yes, all right,

a little more please—30 seconds.

Uh, Nikolai Vladimirovich, how do you

propose fighting illegal

migration, given that indeed

the roots of illegal migration lie not in

the migrants themselves, but in those who use

their near-slave labor and receive enormous

profits from it? I completely agree with you,

Ivan Ivanovich. Could I, 30 years

ago, when I arrived in Moscow, have imagined

that in the 21st century we would encounter in the capital

of our Motherland labor like this, with this

bestial grin of capitalism? Therefore, illegal

migration must be fought

by exposing its economic essence, its

corrupt economic essence.

That means we need to consider the bill we have introduced

stipulating that deportation—let us start

with this—of undocumented migrants

is carried out at the expense of the employers,

the swindlers who hired them.

These employers must bear

responsibility, up to and including criminal liability. And at the very

least, they must lose their licenses for

carrying out construction and other work in

the territory of the city of Moscow, so that they

think twice before doing it again. Then, little by little, we will

rid ourselves of illegal migrants. Well,

again,

I am not even talking about those who

come here not to work but to engage in crime,

but they simply need to be identified. Thank you.

Your question, Mikhail

Vladimirovich. Yes.

Professor Mikhail Vladimirovich, let us start with

schools. As is well known, Moscow schools are seeing

more and more children of these

unfortunate—or fortunate—migrants, and

these children do not know Russian, while

the city education program is

so

declarative that, in essence, they are left defenseless;

no one is helping them. What do you think

needs to be done in order to cope

with this problem? Let us start with the fact that in

the State Duma there is already

a bill from the LDPR faction (Liberal Democratic Party of Russia) that

is raising the requirements for knowledge of Russian

language, from labor migrants

to applicants for Russian

citizenship. A minimum of 10,000 words is

the average vocabulary needed to speak fluently.

This applies both to children and to those who

have come here, even though we did not invite them.

Of course, to be frank, let us begin here

by talking about the education program.

In Moscow, the program is, frankly speaking, not bad.

The main problem in schools today is not

education, but food, and I have already spoken about this.

I said so in the previous debate as well. They tell me

there is a Government resolution under

which schools are required to provide hot

meals. Has anyone actually seen these hot

meals? There are just scraps there, and at the expense of

the parents. So under me, of course,

we will improve education, but really

and most importantly, we will improve school meals

and make them, for Moscow, for Moscow

schoolchildren,

free of charge. And your question to Alexei

Anatolyevich. Alexei Anatolyevich, you are so

smiley.

You barely finished an American university, which

I am proud of, changed parties, dumped Mitrokhin with

his Yabloko (a Russian liberal political party), and now you are running from

PARNAS (People's Freedom Party), and all your activity is

some kind of murky business. So I

am asking you frankly: you have,

I repeat, a conviction. God willing, may it

be overturned. Are you planning to

emigrate from our great Russia yourself?

Not for the time being.

An excellent question. Thank you very much.

Mikhail, for that question. Despite the fact

that in our country, in our wonderful

country, and in my wonderful city,

which I love very much, there are a huge number

of problems that arise, including

because State Duma deputies keep stringing

us along for years. If you listen to them, they are all in favor

of introducing a visa regime, so why

do you not pass a law on it then?

Despite the fact that there are many

problems, I am running

in this election now in order to solve these

problems, because behind me stand

hundreds of thousands and millions of people who

are fed up with this life, fed up with the situation in which

Moscow ranks third in the world

by budget size, but by quality of life

it is in 154th place. And I am absolutely sure that

Muscovites will support my program. I

am sure they will come to the polls. Let us make it so

that the 20% of young Muscovites who

now say that they would like to

emigrate from Moscow will instead say

that they want to live in Moscow, work in

Moscow, and start their families in Moscow.

Surely they also want to ask their

question to Sergei. Well, “millions of supporters” is

all, excuse me, just empty talk. Support from millions

has to be measurable.

Come on, we do not have much time

left. Alexei Anatolyevich, please

ask your

question. I only know that in the

last election your great leader

got 4%, so please behave

more quietly. Sergei Sergeyevich, allow me

to ask you a question. I hold a huge number

of meetings with voters, and at

every meeting I ask: what is the

salary of a janitor, your janitor,

a Tajik or Uzbek? And everyone tells me: 8,

10, 15 thousand. Under the minimum standard, this

janitor should be earning 31,000. Who

is taking that money? Well, Alexei, you

know perfectly well that the main

employer of illegal migrants

is the Moscow city government, which

allows them to work in the housing and utilities system

where on paper one person receives the salary,

a cut is passed on to the migrant, and so he works cheaply.

If I become mayor, then I

will first of all ban from participating in

city procurement any companies

that hire illegal workers. That is first. Second, I

will force them to publish online

information for the public about their staffing lists

and salaries. And one more very important thing:

today there is Article 322.1, organizing

illegal migration. Criminal cases under

this article are not opened because

the authorities themselves are in on it with these

employers. So I will make this

article work.

We will jail

100 to 150 employers who want

to profit from cheap labor, and all of that in

Moscow. Stop it, Dmitry. Mitrokhin’s suspicious

mood swings—something

has to be done. God willing, there is still, there is still

something very interesting in your programs.

A statement—I will quote it briefly.

Because now there is time left only

for each of you to ask one another

a question. Well, may I make a suggestion? Or without

a suggestion—may I continue now?

Moscow pension supplements will

rise to 24,000. For example, you promise

—and what will the pension be? Well, there are various

promises here: instead of a tiny benefit for

each child, there will be 50% of the real

subsistence minimum, and so on and so

forth. We would also very much like

to hear specifics today on

social policy as well. Sergei Sergeyevich,

please ask your

question. Wait, so first I get to ask my question

—no, there will not be, there will not be. You know, I will move the question aside, we

we do not have much time left, so

I will give you the opportunity then. I wanted

to

my timer, because I was interrupted here.

Please restart the timer for

Sergei... Vseva Ivanovich, I have this...

I have a troubling feeling that Sobyanin

has already begun to back away from the city's social

obligations. There has been no

indexation of pension supplements; benefits

for people with disabilities related to garages and for veterans

have been discontinued. Tell me, please, don't you think

that if Sonin is elected mayor,

then later

both...

You know, I think that at best

what can be said is that over the past three

years, social obligations in Moscow

have been frozen, and given that there is

massive inflation,

of course Muscovites feel

socially, in terms of social

protection, significantly worse off. But there are

some very alarming facts, and about some of them

I simply must speak today. There is

the unique Hospital No. 6 for

Muscovites and elderly people; as a result of reorganization, it

is being merged, and

in effect it is ceasing

to exist. The situation is dire

for people with disabilities. Here, the company Mos-

Elektropribor is laying off

84 disabled employees, having received for these

jobs 16 million rubles from the Moscow budget two years ago

from the Moscow budget. The company Olimp

is removing 102 disabled workers, cutting jobs

after receiving 32 million rubles from the budget

of Moscow, and this, I believe, is simply

unacceptable in our capital. And what would you

like to hear from the candidate from

A Just Russia, Nikolai Vladimirovich?

You know, by the results of 2012, Moscow

was recognized as the most expensive city in Europe and

one of the most expensive cities in the world.

The gap between the richest 10 percent and the poorest 10 percent

is more than fiftyfold. Why do you think

this is happening, and how can such

terrible phenomena be

combated? Thank you. Ivan Ivanovich, I

completely agree with you. I hope that

Mikhalych won't interrupt me, but I

have my last minute on the air, and I

would like to address all Muscovites, all

voters, to congratulate them on the

upcoming City Day, which falls on September 7, and which

from the standpoint of election

law is the day of silence. And on behalf of

my fellow candidates for mayor

of Moscow, I want to appeal to acting mayor Sergei

Semyonovich Sobyanin, who promised that

he would spend that day from morning to evening

together with Muscovites in open

public venues: not to forget to invite to this

celebration us ordinary Muscovites,

the candidates for mayor of Moscow. This is not a holiday of

City Hall alone; it is a holiday for all

Muscovites, and a holiday for all candidates

for mayor of Moscow, and we should spend this day

together from morning until late evening.

Once again, I apologize to the viewers for

the fact that they are trying to make clowns out of us.

A wonderful toast, I think—a very Friday-like...

Please, ask your

question.

Mikha... social policy. I...

You are a young Muscovite, as you yourself

admit, yes. And here in Moscow, since

this year, a residency qualification has been introduced, and

the pension supplement bringing it up to 12,000 rubles

is received only by those who

have been registered in Moscow for at least 10 years,

while everyone else can count

only on the subsistence minimum—

7,137 rubles. You are a young Muscovite—how

do you feel about this? Extremely negatively.

Let me start by saying that we do not need to go to

City Day with Sobyanin—you go with him

as a sweet little pair; we'll go elsewhere.

Next point: the fact that 12,000

rubles as a minimum pension is completely

unacceptable. This is Moscow. Our average

salary, because some officials

and top managers of state corporations supposedly

bring it up, is 64,000 rubles. The average salary

of an ordinary person is 20,000 to 25,000 rubles; a pension is

12,000 to 15,000. Just look at prices in Moscow.

Therefore, we will cancel this residency qualification, raise

pensions, restore all supplements for pensioners, and

for all public-sector employees...

And do you know why? Because this

is written in the president's May decrees; they

are mandatory, and not one of

these people wants to be mayor—they have not even

read the president's mandatory decrees. On September 8,

vote for the LDPR candidate

—for me, for all the candidates...

Listen, I want to point something out. The draw

just worked out this way. I have a question for Mitrokhin, for

Melnikov, and for... Why do I keep

asking Navalny?

My question is for Navalny.

Ready. Ask your question to Navalny.

Please. All right then: will you carry out

the president's May decrees—reduce

road deaths, reduce ... mortality,

raise salaries to the average for

Moscow, and double them, as it says here in

this program of mine? And now it is already

Alexei Anatolyevich's time. Well, in general...

Dear Muscovites, this is unfair.

Why are all the questions for Navalny? I have

a very strict time limit, Professor...

Please restart my timer—it hasn't

started. Excellent, it's started, so I will

carry out my mayoral program, as

any normal mayor who ran with a program

is supposed to do. I

would like to respond, since we are talking about

social policy, about those

pension increases that are also in our

program, which you so ironically

dismissed as populist. In our

program there really is a strict

One point we will definitely carry out is that we

will double the Moscow supplement. Right now

it is 4,500 rubles, and we will double it. And

in doing so, we will establish a minimum standard

for the social pension at 16,000 rubles. This will

cost the Moscow budget 138 billion rubles,

and my team and I know where

to get this money. The Moscow budget

can already afford it as it is. Moreover,

our planned anti-corruption measures

our priority measures

will additionally free up no less than 180

billion rubles, so we have the money

to raise pensions for Muscovites.

On the 8th, come out and vote.

Bring your families. Vote so that

power returns to the people, please.

You still have a chance to ask a question

to Sergei Sergeyevich. We have very little time.

A very short question, very short,

a very simple question. Sergei Sergeyevich,

our authorities love to say that

Moscow's budget is socially oriented, and that in general

the policy is social, and everything is social in

our city. But for some reason the standard of living

is such that everything in Moscow costs twice

as much—food, a square meter of housing, a carton

of milk, a kilogram of meat—everything is more expensive than in

any European city. Is

the budget really social? Is this policy

really social?

I believe that this policy is plainly anti-

social, even in this very issue.

Look, there is a clear-out underway,

the destruction of neighborhood shops

within walking distance, and now markets have also been closed. I

recently went to the Vykhino market, and

pensioners asked me: are we supposed to go

to the supermarket now? Carrots and

parsley are more expensive there. So that alone is already

anti-social. Then there are the concrete facts.

Look, today the child allowance for low-income

families is 800 rubles. That is the cost

of the paperwork, essentially, of all the documents

needed to receive this benefit. I

believe that at a minimum, of course, it should be raised

to 10,000. We are talking about

people in need, I repeat. As for

people with disabilities—yes, ramps have been installed in some places, but

you cannot just put ramps in a few isolated spots.

They need to be everywhere, first and foremost in

building entrances, so that a person with a disability can actually get out

of the entrance. There need to be ramps at curbs as well.

None of this is being done.

It's nothing but PR and empty talk.

Thank you, thank you, dear candidates, for

answering, for answering

all the questions. Because right now,

in the course of this program, I think

your platforms have been presented very well.

It may have seemed that I was only asking Navalny

questions, but that was

the luck of the draw. You asked your questions and familiarized everyone

with your program, so

you presented that information

in your own way.

Let's try to correct that

in the next broadcasts. Let me remind you:

this week, instead of the scheduled

3 hours, we were on air for almost 4

hours. So, of course, we will see you again in

2 weeks on the Doveriye TV channel, very

early in the morning—it will be at 8 a.m. And next

week, waiting for you, waiting for you

will be Moscow in a Week, in a week, yes. And you

said in two—I'm getting mixed up again.

Something's off in my head. Dear Muscovites, vote for

the LDPR, and on September 8—yes, September 8—

there will be elections. Thank you very much for listening

to our

candidates.

Thank you.

Uh.