Successful ASR Prevention in Germany: Influencing Factors and Adequate Measures

Alkali-Silica Reaction (ASR) in concrete pavements has become a real problem in Germany in the end of the 1990s / beginning of the 2000s. In an extensive research project, the background for such ASR-damaging has been examined intensively at the Ruhr University Bochum. ASR in concrete pavements is not only influenced by the reactivity of the aggregate, but rather by a superposition of different influencing factors. For concrete pavements for example, there are specific conditions that increase an ASR significantly. On the one hand, concrete pavements are microstructurally damaged by the superposition of cyclic stresses induced by traffic and climate changes, and on the other hand they are exposed to alkaline de-icing agents during the wintertime. Thereby, an ASR-promoting external alkali supply is given. Three absolute preconditions are necessary for an ASR to occur: potentially reactive aggregates, sufficient supply of alkalis and an adequate degree of moisture. In Germany, there have been numerous measures taken in the last 10 to 15 years in order to prevent ASR-damages in concrete pavements. Already in 2005 the alkali-content (Na₂O-Equivalent) allowed in cements for concrete pavements has been limited to 0.8% by mass. Additionally, in each case the aggregates intended to be used must be assessed beforehand in a special procedure. Since these requirements were established by the highway-authorities in 2005 (with modifications in 2013) there have been no new damages related to ASR observed on concrete pavements, which have been constructed in compliance with these guidelines.

One-time voluntary declaration in Ukraine

Problem setting. In recent years, law-making in Ukraine in the field of taxation has undergone significant changes. Such transformations are related to many factors, for example: (1) the need to bring national tax legislation in line with the provisions of international standards; (2) introduction of modern technologies into the sphere of tax and legal regulation; (3) actualization of the issue of filling the revenue parts of budgets in a pandemic, etc. Taking into account these and other factors, the state must implement appropriate measures, implement new legislation. Thus, one of the latest novelties of tax legislation is the introduction in accordance with the Law of Ukraine “On Amendments to the Tax Code of Ukraine and other laws of Ukraine to stimulate de-shadowing of incomes and increase tax culture of citizens by introducing one-time (special) voluntary declaration of assets and payment one-time collection to the budget ”(hereinafter – the Law № 1539) [11] voluntary tax declaration, which in fact provides for a tax amnesty. Analysis of recent researches and publications. It is significant that the institution of amnesty is not new to law, in particular, tax, and its research was carried out by such lawyers as: T.O. Belova, M. P. Kucheryavenko, I.V. Pivovarova, I. V. Prikhodko, V. O. Ryadinska, E. M. Smychok. At the same time, in modern conditions, the legal mechanism of its implementation has undergone appropriate transformations, which in turn necessitates an analysis of modern approaches to the definition and regulation of tax amnesty. Target of research is to analyze various aspects of the legal regulation of one-time (special) voluntary declaration as a mechanism of tax amnesty in Ukraine. Article’s main body. The article considers the legal regulation of one-time (special) voluntary tax declaration, reveals its legal mechanism and content characteristics. It is established that the signs of modern tax amnesty are: 1) special subject composition – only natural persons-taxpayers; 2) specific objects of declaration – assets of natural persons located on the territory of Ukraine and / or abroad, if they are received (acquired) by such natural person at the expense of income that was subject to taxation in Ukraine at the time of their accrual (receipt) which have not been paid or not paid in full taxes and fees, and / or which have not been declared in violation of tax and currency legislation; 3) voluntary – the taxpayer decides at his own discretion to use such legislative innovations or not; 4) temporal limitation (only from September 1, 2021 to September 1, 2022); 5) payment – the subject of declaring pays a fee to the budget for the use of special voluntary declaration, the amount of which is calculated taking into account specific rates; 6) a special procedure for submitting such a declaration. Conclusions and prospect of development. It is emphasized that it is too early to state the positive consequences of the introduction of such a mechanism (especially for the taxpayers). The necessity and expediency of building a tax system and a system of administration of taxes and fees with a high degree of trust in the state in the taxpayer are emphasized.

Urgent applications in French administrative justice

The institute of urgent judicial decisions is a special procedure for administrative justice bodies in France, which allows to prescribe effectively and quickly a wide range of necessary measures (from the appointment of expert examinations to the suspension of normative administrative acts) and to protect the legitimate interests of individuals and organizations. There are two main categories of urgent judicial decisions, accordingly their functional purpose. The procedural features of urgent judicial decisions are related to the obligation of the French administrative courts to establish conditions for urgency and the need to prescribe certain measures as a matter of urgency. These criteria, being evaluative, are specified by the jurisprudence of the French administrative courts, according to which the judge determines whether there is a threat of causing immediate and sufficiently serious harm to the interests of the applicant and whether there is a need to take urgent measures, taking into account the circumstances of the case. At the same time, the urgent applications judge does not consider the case, but sets temporary measures that can be changed in the course of further proceedings. The article suggests creating mechanisms in Russian law that are similar to those existing in the French legal regulation of urgent judicial decisions in administrative cases. In particular, the author suggests expanding the powers of Russian courts to suspend normative administrative acts and individual decisions when courts take measures of preliminary protection in administrative claims.

Legal regime: the concept and features

The purpose of the study is to conduct a general theoretical analysis of scientific approaches to the definition of the concept and essence of the legal regime in order to overcome its narrow industrial understanding and identify the role and significance in the process of legal regulation. General scientific and private scientific methods of knowledge including formal legal and comparative legal methods have been chosen as research methods of this paper. Logical techniques allowing to reveal the essence of legal regimes and formulate the author's definition of them have also been applied. The analysis of scientific works expressing various opinions indicates that at present an instrumental approach to the definition of the concept and essence of the legal regime prevails directly (or indirectly through the procedure of legal regulation) as a set of legal means (instruments). The following are mentioned as signs of the legal regime: mandatory normative legal consolidation (formal legal nature), specific target, special regulatory order based on a combination of legal means and methods of legal regulation, in relation to subjects of law, i.e., in a subjective sense, creating of favorable (or unfavorable) conditions to achieve certain interests, systemic and integrated character of a regime and its special structure. As a result, the author's definition of the legal regime is presented as a special procedure for the legal regulation of public relations, based on a certain combination of legal means and methods of legal regulation (permits, prohibitions, and positive obligations) aimed at achieving the relevant legal goals and planned optimal socially significant result.

Deferred expenses: Theory and practice of accounting

Subject. This article examines the issues related to the operations of deferred expenses for the relevance and necessity of applying a special procedure for attributing costs that may belong to future periods, to the expenses of the reporting period. Objectives. The article aims to find a logically verified methodology for accounting for costs related to the current and future periods and their reflection in the financial statements. Methods. For the study, I used a systems approach and logical generalization. Results. The study shows that in the organizations’ business life, there are cases of a need to accumulate certain types of costs on a special account with their subsequent write-off for expenses in the periods when these costs begin to bring economic benefits. Such costs must be significant in amount and be of an investment nature. Otherwise, there are risks of the accrual principle (assumption) violation. Conclusions and Relevance. The accounting regulator in the Russian Federation needs to make adjustments to the regulatory documents that determine the procedure for classification, accounting and disclosure of information in the accounting (financial) statements, providing in the first section of the financial position report an unambiguously interpreted item for deferred expenses not attributable to the reporting years, as well as related information in other forms of accounting (financial) statements. Adjustments also need to be made to existing accounting provisions to eliminate conflicts and discrepancies with respect to deferred expenses. The results of the study are intended to develop theoretical views on the methodology of accounting for costs and expenses of organizations and the promotion in practice of this approach to the classification of costs between current and deferred expenses.

Some Questions Arising in the Trial of Civil Lawsuits in the Criminal Court of First Instance

The article discusses some problems of considering a civil claim during a criminal court hearing. It is argued that settling a civil claim during criminal proceedings has a higher priority than a trial in a civil process. The author justifies the position according to which filing a lawsuit during criminal proceedings is a right and not an obligation of a person in a criminal trial. The author also believes that in filing a civil claim in a criminal process, the civil plaintiff should present proof of the incurred costs with the purpose of further recovery of the material damage; besides, the person who will pay the damage or compensate for the moral harm should be established. Based on the analysis of court practice, it is proven that the settlement of a civil claim during a special procedure of a criminal court trial is possible, however, the accused should agree not only with the accusation, but also with the size of the damage (harm). The cases in which the courts can eliminate violations of criminal procedure legislation during preliminary investigations are examined.

Some Procedural Aspects of Deprivation of Immunity from Criminal Prosecution

The paper examines certain aspects of deprivation of immunity from criminal prosecution. Considering the procedures for bringing to criminal responsibility persons in respect of whom a special procedure for criminal proceedings has been established by law, the author concludes that the initiation of a criminal case by the head of a higher investigative body does not constitute a deprivation of immunity. In this regard, it is proposed to abandon this procedure and initiate a criminal case in the usual manner, namely by the preliminary investigation body, which has jurisdiction over the case. Analyzing the circle of participants in the procedure for the deprivation of immunity, the author argues that the subjects appealing to the highest bodies of state power (and such bodies themselves) rendering the decision on the deprivation of immunity are not ordinary participants in criminal proceedings. They rather carry out constitutional and legal activities, the results and decisions of which are implemented in the criminal procedure. Exploring the grounds for giving consent to bring a person to criminal liability, the author draws attention to the different approach of the legislator to different categories of persons and proposes to unify the regulatory framework. The public authority must establish two circumstances: the presence of elements of a crime and the absence of a connection between the criminal prosecution and the person’s public law activities.

A Dataset Quality Assessment—An Insight and Discussion on Selected Elements of Environmental Footprints Methodology

One of the most recently developed life cycle-based methods is an environmental footprint of products and organisations established by the European Commission. A special procedure of data and dataset quality assessment has been developed as a part of the environmental footprints methodology. The procedure may be recognised as vital and powerful but, at the same time, a bit complicated and time-consuming. It is worth discussing this subject and looking for potential simplification. In this paper, we suggest a possible way for simplification. We propose to remove an impact-assessment-based step from the procedure of company-specific datasets quality assessment. There are two potential benefits: a reduction in the need for expert knowledge and time savings. The threats posed are connected to the fact that all data influences the Data Quality Rating indicator of the entire dataset to the same degree. With a higher volume of data included in the assessment, there is a risk of greater differentiation in their quality. In this paper, an example of raw milk production is presented. The assessment of quality of the dataset was performed in three variants: pursuant to the approach established by the European Commission in the pilot phase, transition phase and with certain modifications employed.

CUSTOMS FORMALITIES FOR FOREIGN WARSHIPS, THEIR ARMS AND CREWS IN THE UKRAINIAN PORTS

The article is devoted to determining the current state and ways to improve the legal regulation of customs formalities for foreign warships, their arms and crews in the Ukrainian ports. The relevance of the research topic is due to the need to find the optimal model of legal regulation for such activities in Ukraine as the state port and the fragmentation of current legal research in the field of custom port formalities. The purpose of the article is to define the current state of organizational and legal regulation for the implementation of customs formalities for foreign warships, their arms and crews in the Ukrainian seaports, outlining possible ways to update and improve it. The methodological basis of the research is formed by general scientific and special legal methods of scientific knowledge (dialectical, analysis and synthesis, scientific abstraction, forecasting). The task of the article is to develop proposals for improving the legal regulation of customs formalities applicable to foreign warships in the Ukrainian ports. The article characterizes and analyzes the provisions of law, regulations and local acts in force in the Ukrainian seaports. It is noted that the current legislation of Ukraine, according to the established practice of navigation and customary norms embodied in international treaties, defines a special procedure for customs formalities in respect of foreign warships, their arms and crews. The characteristic feature of such legislation is that almost identical rules on such formalities are placed in different normative acts of different legal force. This specifies the necessity to develop a universal normative document that would define all aspects of entry, stay and leaving the inland waters for foreign warships, in particular to the waters of the Ukrainian seaports.

SPECIAL RULES OF PROCEDURE IN CIVIL AND COMMERCIAL DISPUTES OF SMALL VALUE

The paper presents legal provisions, attitudes of court practice and opinions of legal science on special procedure in litigation on small claims. The concept, history and significance of the small dispute are explained. The issues concerning the census, ie the threshold value of the subject matter of the dispute on which the application of this special type of procedure depends, were especially considered. The problem of a large number of proceedings in small disputes, the value of which is so low that the mechanism of judicial protection should not be initiated, was pointed out, as well as the necessity of prescribing a minimum threshold for the admissibility of a lawsuit. On the other hand, too high a prescribed threshold in small value disputes does not correspond to the economic strength of citizens, which leads to a reduction in the quality of judicial protection in disputes that are of great importance to the party. Then, the most important specifics of the small dispute were analyzed, which are manifested in the consequences of the absence of the parties from the main hearing, as well as in the limitation of the grounds of appeal by excluding the principle of beneficium novorum. The procedural-legal significance of the absence of the plaintiff is presented, which is reflected in the occurrence of the fiction of withdrawing the lawsuit. Also, the conditions for passing a verdict due to absence as a consequence of the defendant's absence from the main hearing, which is based on the fiction of admitting the facts, were analyzed. It was pointed out that the decision resolving a small value dispute cannot be challenged due to an erroneously or incompletely established factual situation, but only due to an absolutely significant violation of the provisions of civil procedure and due to incorrect application of substantive law. Finally, proposals for amending the law were given, in order to facilitate the application of procedural norms and increase the efficiency of the procedure.