Rational use of funds and purchase of own premises are the main unfulfilled recommendations given by the Higher Audit Commission of the Bar in 2020

In 2020 the Higher Audit Commission of the Bar (hereinafter – the HACB) conducted 9 inspections of financial and economic activities of higher and regional bodies of attorneys` self-government.

This was announced by Maksym Boldin, the Head of the HACB, during the Public Hearings of the UNBA Report for 2020 and the UNBA Development Strategy for 2021-2025.

‘It was quite a difficult year for us because each inspection was postponed because one or another region was in the relevant quarantine zone. However, we conducted 9 inspections in the following regions: Donetsk, Luhansk, Kharkiv, Sumy, Mykolaiv, Kyiv, and Lviv’ - Maksym Boldin told.

 In 2020, the HACB approved 5 conclusions concerning each body of advocacy self-government. During the entire period of the HACB`s work, no complaints were received against the decisions, conclusions, actions, or inactions of the regional audit commission of the bar, its members, and heads.

The Head of the HACB stated that among the most common deviations from the previously provided recommendations, in 2020 in the regions was the irrational use of funds and lack of own premises.

“During the HACB inspections, the following systematic recommendations were provided to the audited entities: to consider the issues of rational use of funds to protect and preserve them; to buy own premises so as not to use the funds for its rent – we have only 10 regions that have its premises; to provide in the budget proposal the fixed amount of salary; to transfer accounting into electronic form and to re-register the code of the type of economic activity" - Maksym Boldin said.

The Head of the UNBA, the BCU, Lydia Izovitova, stressed that the UNBA is currently considering mechanisms to solve these problems, as there are no norms in the legislation that regulate this matter.

"Indeed, in our activities we use the funds from the annual attorneys' fees, and in the activities of the Higher Qualification and Disciplinary Commission of the Bar we use the funds of citizens who pay for the procedures of passing the qualifying exams. The disciplinary proceedings are not funded at all, and there is no established legislative mechanism on how to do this. We are already figuring out how. This financial problem exists, as does the problem with the premises. But if there is a possibility to allocate funds from contributions, then you need to buy such premises. However, the funding from these funds has other uses and we cannot make it dependent to buy the premises or not to buy it. How we will solve these problems in the future - we will think further. But today we are putting points where we have risks, to edit our strategies in future and close these risk channels." - Lydia Izovitova stressed.