You're reading: Housing utility tariffs for households should be increased, but wisely, says Tigipko

Kyiv, May 5 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The Ukrainian government does not plan to implement the instructions of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on the increase of housing utility tariffs for households blindly so that the country might obtain a next tranche from the fund, Vice Premier and Social Policy Minister Sergiy Tigipko has said.

“If to be silly and implement the instructions blindly, despite everything, one could earn money, but create problems for people,” he said in an interview with the Fifth TV Channel on May 4, 2012.

“In my practice there were enough moments when the IMF said one thing, while [the situation worsened] lately. I remember crisis of 1998, I remember what advises were and what it is resulted in – we were left with zero currency reserves,” he said.

“IMF’s ideas from the macroeconomic point of view are good, but we live not in a macroeconomic space, but with concrete people. We hear that we should increase the prices by 32.5% on housing utility services for all households, and I believe that this is a bad idea. If one implements the reform wisely, people would not feel it,” he said.

He said that European countries along with the increase of housing utility tarrifs were realizing energy saving programs.

“The situation in the whole Europe was the following thanks to energy saving programs: housing utility prices grew, while people paid almost the same money as they paid before. This is a wise reform,” Tigipko said.