Proposal to amend 32 laws if planning law passed

However, certain members of the parliament's standing committee have expressed their concern that the additional adjustments would make the law-making agenda too substantial over the next two years.

Minister of Planning and Investment Nguyen Chi Dung said that the 32 laws relevant to planning will be divided into two groups, with the first consisting of 8 less complicated laws that are to be amended first.

Meanwhile changes to the remaining 24 laws, such as those on investment and business, require more time to prepare and assess their impact.

Chairman of the Economic Committee Vu Hong Thanh said that among the 24 aforementioned laws, only the Law on Higher Education is already included in the law-making agenda for 2017.

If the other 23 laws were to be added to the 2018 agenda, the total number of laws to be changed next year would be massive.

Chairman of the Legal Committee Nguyen Khac Dinh suggested that one law should be used to amend many laws in order to avoid an overload for the National Assembly.

For her part, parliament speaker, Nguyen Thi Kim Ngan, stated that the Law on Planning is a necessary move to address the problem of disorganised and inefficient planning in recent years.

She emphasised that if the Law on Planning was not adopted at the upcoming plenary session of the National Assembly, scheduled to open on October 20, it would be a missed opportunity to streamline planning in Vietnam.

(Source: NDO)