On October 17th, 2008 a new law in Ukraine came into effect, literally translated "On the insertion of changes to certain legislative acts in Ukraine on improving regulations in the sphere of street traffic safety" (later "the law"). Most regulations of the new law are dedicated to more severe fines for traffic violations and new powers granted to police officers.
However, due to the fact that violations of traffic rules are considered to be an administrative offence, it has a significant impact on the Code of Ukraine concerning the process of administrative appeals procedure.
The changes concern the appeals procedure of court decisions on the administrative offences, which previously were not well defined. Now this procedure will be used for administrative cases that are connected not only to traffic violations but also labor law, environmental law, custom's law and offences of other legal spheres provided by the Code of Ukraine on administrative offences.
From this time, according to article 294 of the Code of Ukraine on administrative offences, the appeals procedure of court injunction on administrative offence cases are as follows:
The Judge's injunction on administrative offences can be appealed at the appeals court by the person who has been charged with the administrative offence by his representative, the victim, the representative of the victim or can be protested by the prosecutor within ten days of the announcement of the injunction.
The appeals procedure must be provided by a judge from the Criminal Chamber of the appeal court within twenty days of the submission of the case to the court. The injunction of the appeal court comes into the force immediately, and is considered to be finalized and cannot be appealed.
Such changes can be considered as an improvement of administrative procedure since previously the appeals procedure was quite unclear, difficult to enforce, and organized in favor of the state prosecutioner's office.
Due to the fact that administrative punishment could be applied by different state bodies, such decisions could be appealed in court of the first instance. The injunction by the court in the first instance was considered final and could not be appealed, except in certain cases provided by the law. Such exceptions were provided by the Code of Ukraine on administrative offences. Considering that certain administrative offences were subject to court hearings, the court of the first instance could also become the last instance for this category of cases. Those court injunctions that could be appealed, according to the Code of Ukraine on administrative offences, could be changed or canceled only by the Head of a higher standing court or his deputy.
However, despite the fact that court injunctions are considered to be final (the phrase the court injunction is considered to be final and cannot be appealed was used in the text of court inductions on the administrative cases), it could be protested by the prosecutor and such protest would stop the execution of the injunction. This provision was indicated by the Code of Ukraine on administrative offences, meanwhile the code did not establish the term during which the prosecutor could address the protest. The protested court injunction could be changed or canceled by the same judge who issued the injunction or by the Head of a higher standing court or his deputy.
Of course, such a situation violates the right of the person appealing and the principles of equality of all the parties of the court procedure.
Considering the stated above, we may conclude that despite the fact only court practice will show whether the new legislative changes will be efficient. Still, such changes should have a cleansing effect on Ukrainian legislation from former Soviet penal regulations.
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