Adjustment Of The Criminal Legislation Of Ukraine: Problems Of Implementation Of The Provisions Of Part Six Of Article 3 Of The Criminal Code Of Ukraine

Abstract

The article focuses on the issue of implementing the provision of Part 6 of Article 3 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine, according to which amendments to the legislation of Ukraine on criminal liability may be made exclusively by laws amending this Code and/or the criminal procedure legislation of Ukraine and/or the legislation of Ukraine on administrative offenses. Given that amendments to legal acts are a generalized concept which combines such forms of amendments as changes and additions to these legal acts, the author concludes that the legislator’s activities which consist in amending and supplementing these legal acts have different content. The following shortcomings of the wording of Part 6 of Article 3 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine are identified: the requirement to amend the Criminal Code of Ukraine, the CPC of Ukraine and the Code of Administrative Offenses does not include such a form of criminal law amendment as a supplement; the relevant requirement does not include the Criminal Code of Ukraine in the list of codes which may be the exclusive subject of amendment of the Criminal Code of Ukraine. An analysis of the amendatory laws of Ukraine on criminal liability adopted after the entry into force of the law amending Article 3 of the CC of Ukraine with Part 6 led to the conclusion that the legislator did not comply with the relevant legislative imperative. After all, amendments to the Criminal Code of Ukraine have always been made by “complex” corrective laws which concerned not only the Criminal Code of Ukraine, the CPC of Ukraine and the Code of Administrative Offenses, but also other regulatory legal acts or were included in other general regulatory legal acts in independent subsections of these laws or their final and transitional provisions. Conceptually, the author provides arguments regarding the expediency of excluding Part 6 of Article 3 of the Criminal Code of Ukraine from the CC of Ukraine and introducing appropriate amendments to the Rules of Procedure of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, which relate to the mechanism of consideration of draft laws of regulatory and protective purpose relating to the same or similar issues of legal regulation.