VietNamNet Bridge – Administrative violations related to marine, mineral, environmental and land management may increase up to VND2 billion or US$100,000.
This is one of the new features of the draft Law on Administrative Fine, which was reported to the National Assembly (NA) on November 3.

Minister of Home Affairs Nguyen Thai Binh said that administrative fine will rise, from VND10,000 to VND50,000 ($0.4-2.2) for the minimum level and from VND500 million ($25,000) to VND2 billion ($100,000) for the maximal level.

Violations that face the maximal fine belong to five areas: management of sea and continental shelf, nuclear and nuclear power, forestry, monetary and credit management, water, oil and gas and mineral management, environment and land management.

Chairman of the NA’s Legal Committee Phan Trung Ly said that it is necessary to raise fines but other economic, social and education solutions are also important. For example, owners of illegal construction works must have to pay fines, which are not very high, but they have to destroy the illegal works.

Ly also said that the current rules on administrative fines have been applied for three years but the fine has been raised by 4-5 times, which is inappropriate to the country’s development and the people’s income.

He also said that the fine levels stipulated in the draft law does not correspond with that in the Civil Code.

The draft Law on Administrative Fine also allows some regions to apply higher fines. Accordingly, citizens of some big cities like Hanoi and HCM City will have to pay higher fines for violations related to traffic, environment and urban order.

The NA’s Legal Committee said that that difference will create inequality at the same administrative level. Some cities are applying higher fines for some types of violations, on a trial basis and Ly said that it is needed to wait for the end of trial to summarize and then change the law.

Other new contents of the draft Law on Administrative Fine include abolishing compulsory treatment over prostitutes (only apply for drug addicts of 18 upwards), restricting the application of compulsory education with teenage of less than 14.

The bill will be voted at the next NA session.

Draft Advertising Law

Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism Hoang Tuan Anh on November 3 presented the bill on advertising, which is upgraded from the Ordinance on Advertising.

The bill includes regulations on the increase of advertising area and time for all kinds of newspapers and abolishment of advertising restrictions.

For advertising on e-newspapers, “the advertising area on online newspapers must not overlap the area for news and it must not exceed 25 percent of the page on screen.”

Inspecting the bill, the NA’s Committee for Culture, Education, Youth and Children said that the above regulation is inappropriate with the function and technology of electronic devices. The area of each page can change by moving the mouse. Moreover, advertisements on online newspapers can also appear on different devices like computers, cell phones and televisions so the rules on advertisements on e-newspapers must cover these factors.

Under the current regulations, only online newspapers and online information pages must have licenses while advertisement through blogs, social networks, emails are out of control. Some websites based on foreign servers are also free in offering advertising activities for Vietnamese.

Dao Trong Thi, Chairman of the NA’s Committee for Culture, Education, Youth and Children, said that it is necessary to consider the characters of the above means. Moreover, the bill needs to make clear concepts of advertising area, content area, and mobile advertising areas because these are basic concepts for online newspapers.

According to the committee’s survey, only three online newspapers in Vietnam are operating at profit or break even – VietNamNet, Dan Tri and VnExpress. Therefore, if restricting sources of income from advertising, many online newspapers will be unable to exist.

The survey also showed that most of online newspapers and information websites in Vietnam have advertisements. This form of advertisement accounts for only three percent of total spending for advertisement on the media. However, this kind of advertisement is very potential in the future.

The draft Law on Advertising also has regulations on advertisement through text messages, email, etc.

Thi said that advertising spams on cell phones and in emails annoy the users so the law needs to have detailed regulations on this issue.

This bill will be amended further and will not be voted in this NA session.

Le Nhung