UPDATE (June 29, 2024): On June 28, the NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC) revised the Emergency Response Law (effective Nov. 1, 2024) and the Border Health and Quarantine Law (effective Jan. 1, 2025); passed the Rural Collective Economic Organizations Law (effective May 1, 2025) and an amendment to the Accounting Law (effective July 1, 2024); and approved a decision authorizing the State Council to suspend certain provisions of the Food Safety Law in the Hainan Free Trade Port (effective Oct. 1, 2024).
China’s top legislature, the 14th NPC Standing Committee (NPCSC), will convene for its tenth session from June 25 to 28, the Council of Chairpersons decided on Monday, June 17. The Council proposed an agenda with ten legislative bills, all of which are pending bills that return for further review. The agenda also includes a report by the State Council that might be of wider interest. We briefly discuss these items below.
First, the draft Emergency Response and Management Law [突发事件应对管理法] (to replace the existing Emergency Response Law [突发事件应对法]) and draft Rural Collective Economic Organizations Law [农村集体经济组织法] return for their third—and most likely final—review.
Second, the draft revision to the Border Health and Quarantine Law [国境卫生检疫法] and draft amendment to the Accounting Law [会计法] both return for their second review and will likely pass as well.
The Emergency Response Law and the Border Health and Quarantine Law were scheduled for update soon after the Covid-19 pandemic began. The bills seek to address the weaknesses in the existing statutory schemes that have been exposed by the pandemic and to codify certain measures used to contain Covid-19. The draft revision to the latter law, for instance, would expressly authorize the relevant State Council departments to cut flights, require that inbound travelers submit to testing before boarding flights (i.e., obtain health codes), restrict entry of travelers from specific regions, and suspend the issuance of passports or visas. We plan to discuss the two bills further after they pass (perhaps in our newsletter).
Third, these five bills will undergo their second (but not final) review:
- draft Financial Stability Law [金融稳定法];
- draft Preschool Education Law [学前教育法];
- draft revision to the Public Security Administration Punishments Law (PSAPL) [治安管理处罚法];
- draft revision to the Cultural Relics Protection Law [文物保护法]; and
- draft revision to the Mineral Resources Law [矿产资源法].
Among them, the new draft of the PSAPL revision will likely attract the most attention. To refresh your memory (after all, it was last reviewed almost a year ago), this is the bill that would—among an array of other important changes you should not overlook—punish clothing or speech that “is detrimental to the spirit of the Chinese people or hurts the feelings of the Chinese people.” This provision has produced a strong backlash from the Chinese public, and almost 100,000 people commented on the bill last summer.
Such an intense public response in turn prompted the NPCSC Legislative Affairs Commission to issue a rare statement last September on the controversy over the bill:
The public’s submission of comments on draft laws through normal channels is a concrete expression of the people’s concern for and orderly participation in national legislative work and is of great significance, and we sincerely welcome it. [The NPCSC Legislative Affairs Commission] will carefully sort out and study the various opinions submitted by the public and relevant parties on the draft laws for public consultation, including provisions thereof that have caused concern, and will put forward suggestions for revising and improving them or properly handling them.
We will therefore watch with great interest what changes have been made to the draft.
Finally, the State Council’s request for authorization to suspend unspecified provisions of the Food Safety Law [食品安全法] within the Hainan Free Trade Port—introduced in April—will return for another review as well. We observed that this is one of the only two post-2012 reform authorizations that did not pass after a single review. The press release of a subsequent research trip taken by the NPC Constitution and Law Committee to Hainan suggests that the requested authorization would relax the requirements for importing two types of “special foods” [特殊食品]: dietary supplements [保健食品] and foods for special medical purposes [特殊医学用途配方食品]. “Special foods” are subject to “strict supervision and management” under the Food Safety Law, which might explain why the legislature is taking another look at the State Council’s request. We expect the NPCSC to grant the authorization next week.
The NPCSC will hear a report by the State Council on “promoting the development of the private economy” next week. According to the NPCSC’s 2024 oversight work plan, the report and its deliberations will focus on “the implementation of initiatives to promote the development of the private economy; the current situation of the private economy and, in particular, its development since the New Era; the new circumstances, new situations, and new challenges [China] faces; existing problems and difficulties; and plans and suggestions for next steps.”
As we noted in the NPC Calendar for this month, a reform authorization granted by the NPCSC in April 2021 (zh | en) concerning seven laws will expire on July 1, but no pertinent bill to extend the authorization or codify the reforms (in whole or in part) appears on the NPCSC’s tentative agenda next week (except for the Accounting Law amendment, which might actually reject the relevant reform). Such a bill could still be added to the agenda at the last minute, however, so stay tuned.