Reservation quotas are being reduced, but not as much as they were going to be.
For energy and defense enterprises, they will be at 95%. For the utilities sector, reservations will remain at 75%, and for businesses — 50% (as before).
The Ministry of Defense is in favour of 100% reservation for defense manufacturers. The Defense Minister Yevhenii Khmara explained to journalists that enterprises should scale up production of critical systems for the front, and the state should create conditions for the fulfillment of their contracts. At the same time, it should take into account the real contribution of the enterprise to providing the Defense Forces.
The warnings of the Ministry of Defense and weapons manufacturers were heard — defense enterprises will reserve 95% of employees.
The reduction in the limit should not apply to those employees who directly ensure the production process, the implementation of defense contracts, operational, repair and emergency recovery work. All of them should be reserved. The head of the enterprise independently determines whom to reserve within the allocated quota, so employees in auxiliary and support roles will be unreserved.
Reservations are being reviewed again due to a large number of abuses.
Despite the fact that the government significantly changed its approaches to reservations in the summer, the Headquarters decided to review [conditions of] reservations again. According to the Economy Minister Oleksandr Kravchenko, the key reason is the following: new criticality criteria were established in the summer, and 15% of enterprises did not confirm this status, but the number of reservations has increased. It reached 1.4 million at the end of September and is growing by several tens of thousands every month.
According to Babelʼs interlocutor at the Ministry of Economy, more people are now reserving than are being mobilized.
The government explains that reservations are growing because critical enterprises are abusing them. The 100% quota for employees allows enterprises to artificially expand their staff and reserve “shady” people (often for money).
An interlocutor of Babel from the security sector — on condition of anonymity — says that sometimes the amounts reach $5 000. Or, for example, at enterprises, a small number of people are engaged in critical contracts, and the rest are engaged in other projects of the company.
As the ministry says, in general, such abuses are possible because there are at least 50 criticality criteria. They are different in different ministries and regional military administrations that assign these statuses.
In order to align the criteria, the government is creating a Coordination Center.
It will be an advisory body, i.e., in fact, it can only give recommendations to ministries and the Regional Military Administrations. It will become clear later how it will work in real practice. Now we are retelling the Cabinet of Ministersʼ resolution, the point of which was explained to journalists in an off-the-record conversation:
- The Coordination Center should approve the criticality criteria used by ministries and provide recommendations on how these criteria should be refined.
- It will consider applications from government agencies to recognize enterprises as critically important.
- It will recommend revoking the criticality of an enterprise, for example, if it is abusive (in particular, it will consider data from law enforcement officers).
- It can increase the number of reserved workers (more than 50% of employees) if the company justifies it (for example, if logistics centers and warehouses have been affected by Russian attacks and the company needs more drivers and loaders).
In the new resolution, the government has clarified the criticality criteria. However, the resolution has not yet been made public, so they are unknown.
According to Babelʼs interlocutor at the Ministry of Economy, economic indicators are no longer decisive — above all, an enterprise that helps defense is critical. In the next two weeks, the ministries and the Regional Military Administrations are to review their criticality criteria and adjust them with the Coordination Center.
The Coordination Center will be co-chaired by the Deputy Minister of Economy and Environment and the Deputy Minister of Defense. It will also include the following:
A Deputy State Secretary of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine;
A Deputy Minister of Digital Transformation;
A Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs;
A Deputy Minister for Reconstruction, Infrastructure and Transport;
A Deputy Minister of Agrarian Policy and Food;
A Deputy Head of the Office of the President of Ukraine (by consent);
A State Secretary of the Ministry of Energy;
A Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces (by consent);
A First Deputy Head of the State Border Guard Service;
A Deputy Head of the National Police;
A Deputy Chairman of the Pension Fund Board;
A Deputy Head of the State Labor Service;
A Representative of the central department of State Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) (with consent);
A Representative of the Foreign Intelligence Service (with consent);
A Representative of the Main Intelligence Directorate (known as GUR) of the Ministry of Defense (with consent);
A Representative of the Ministry of Economy.
- The government is preparing a mechanism for 100% reservation if the enterprise has fulfilled its mobilization obligation.
“An enterprise will be able to fully reserve employees if it regularly and voluntarily involves some of them in military service. They will retain their jobs and salaries,” explains the Prime Minister Koretsky. According to him, the government hopes to approve a clear and effective mechanism by December 1.
- If a company has recently re-reserved its employees, they will retain their reservation status.
Compliance will be reviewed after the previous reservation period expires. If the company has been removed from critical status, all employees will be unreserved immediately.
- The government is stepping up the fight against "draft dodgers".
The Ministry of Defense is working on a bill that will increase the penalties for evading service. It must be approved by parliament.