Live with President Vladimir Putin - Hot line. Part 2
October 18, 2007
Vladivostok, Novosibirsk, Aktau (Kazakhstan), Yekarinburg, Podkolodnovka Village (Voronezh Region), Plesetsk (Archangelsk Region), Botlikh (Republic of Dagestan), Kazan, Sochi, Krasnaya Polyana, Rzhev (Tver Region), Kaliningrad, Moscow
Прямая линия с Президентом России
18 октября 2007 года
Владивосток, Новосибирск, Актау (Казахстан), Екатеринбург, село Подколодновка (Воронежская область), Плесецк (Архангельская область), Ботлих (Республика Дагестан), Казань, Сочи, Красная Поляна, Ржев (Тверская область), Калининград, Москва
What impact does this have on our peoples lives and on the real social situation? The main indicator here is wages growth. Last year, wages rose on average by 13.4 percent, and this year by 14.4 percent. But what I particularly want to note is that, although wages rose by 13.4 percent on average last year, pensions rose by only 5.1 percent on average. This year, taking into account the increase that will take place as from December 1, pensions will rise by 21 percent on average. I think that this is a decent result. I want to stress that this is real growth, adjusted for inflation. I do realise that we still have problems to address and I will say more about this later, but this growth is real growth and it does take inflation into account.What is especially pleasing to see are the changes in the demographic situation. When we discussed our programmes a couple of years ago, there were sceptics who said that no matter how much money invested in demographic projects, they would not produce results because low birthrates are simply the general trend in all post-industrial countries, including throughout Europe. But I nonetheless agreed with those who said that in our country, if the state gave this problem its attention, we could produce results, and this has proven to be the case.
What have we seen over this last period? The birthrate is higher than it has been for the last 15 years and the mortality rate is at its lowest since 1999. Infant mortality has also come down.Finally, one of the positive effects or positive results of this last year that I would like to name is the reduction in unemployment. Last year, unemployment stood at 6.5 percent, while this year it has dropped to 5.7 percent. To give an idea what this actually means, this figure represents 600,000 people who have found jobs and begun working over this last year.Of course there are still problems, and some of them are very clear, obvious to everyone in this country. They include rising prices and inflation, which we are unlikely to be able to keep within the target limit this year. We had planned for inflation of no more than 8 percent, but cumulative inflation already comes to 8.5 percent this year, and we still have two-and-a-half months to go before the end of the year. This is a problem that the Government must and will address, of course, and I am sure that we will succeed in resolving this problem too, but we need to take swift action to address it now, increasing peoples incomes, especially pensioners incomes.I have decided to increase the basic pension by 300 roubles as from December 1, and this means that some categories of pensioners will see their pensions increase by 500 or more roubles, but the inflation problem still remains.Rising prices go hand in hand with inflation. The Government has adopted a whole package of measures that I hope will bring positive results in this area. I think that we will feel the effects of these measures by the end of the year.
O. SATINKO (Vladivostok, Primorsky Region): Satinko, Olga Vladimirovna, a resident of Russky Island.
Vladimir Vladimirovich,I send you my greetings on behalf of the 7,000 residents of Russky Island.People in the Far East say that there are two Russias: one is the flourishing Russia that reaches to the Urals, and the other, after the Urals, feels all the isolation of an island. It costs a huge amount of money to fly from Vladivostok to Moscow. A return ticket to Moscow costs 45,000 roubles. But if Vladivostok is cut off from the rest of Russia, we on Russky Island are cut off even from Vladivostok. You cannot imagine just how many problems we have: unemployment, poor roads on the island, healthcare, education there are many problems. But the biggest problem of all is the link between the island and the mainland. Our life depends entirely on the ferry, and the ferry depends on the weather. Either theres ice or theres a storm warning, and we end up running along the coast on the island or on the mainland, trying to get back home or trying to get into work or school. For this reason we are often turned down when we apply for jobs.
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В.Путин.Прямая линия.18.10.07.Part 3by niknikolay248 views
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