The National Assembly’s Standing Committee convened its 22nd session in Hanoi on Aug. 11, focusing on seven draft laws as well as several other issues.

During the five-day sitting, the committee will continue querying a number of ministers and give opinions on a number of major points of the bills on Telecom, Electric Radio Frequencies and Cryptography and the naming of the bill on medical check-ups and treatment, said NA Chairman Nguyen Phu Trong at the opening session.

Members of the NA Standing Committee will also discuss the bill on amendments and supplements to a number of articles of the Education Law and the bills on trade arbitration and postal services.

They will hear reports on the implementation of regulations on the management and utilisation of State capital and property by State groups and corporations.

The committee heard NA Deputy Chairwoman Tong Thi Phong’s report on the results of the 30th General Assembly of the ASEAN Inter-Parliamentary Assembly (AIPA-30) in Thailand .

The participants discussed a number of major points of the Bill on Telecom which will comprise 10 chapters and 64 articles, including three new articles compared with the bill presented at the NA’s 5th session.

Many deputies voiced their support to maintain the Public Telecom Fund, which, they said, has operated effectively by providing universal telecom services to remote and disadvantaged areas where service costs are high and incomes are low.

The fund’s financing is contributed by telecom firms and the State in order to help people nationwide benefit from telecom development achievements, they added.

Director of the NA’s Science, Technology and Environment Committee Dang Vu Minh said that the Party and State’s policy encourages all economic sectors to invest in telecom services in line with market mechanisms and a socialist-oriented economy.

“This is an indispensable requirement of the integration process, especially now that the nation is a member of the World Trade Organisation,” he stressed./.