Prague, Jan 20 (CTK) – The Czech Chamber of Deputies yesterday passed an amendment to the law on mining that gives 67 percent of the fees for surface mining of brown coal to the state and 33 percent to the municipalities concerned.
At present, the municipalities receive 75 percent of the fees. Their profits from the mining are not to fall, however, as the mining firms are to pay more for the land used for the mining activities and for the minerals mined if the amendment takes effect next year.
In 2017, the state is to receive in the fees 427 million crowns more than in 2013.
The amendment is yet to be passed by the Senate and signed by the president into law.
The payments for the minerals mined are to double, but the Green Party considers this increase insufficient. “The fees should have been raised at least ten times to have some sense,” Greens chairwoman Jana Drapalova told CTK.
As most of the profit from mining fees would newly go to the state, the state should set up a special social fund that would support miners if they lost their work, she said.
The state presently operates four stations of mining rescuers. These rescuers should be paid directly from the state budget, not from the profits from mined minerals.
During the parliamentary debate on the mining law, Industry and Trade Minister Jan Mladek said the coalition government decided that it would not support the production of shale gas.
($1=24.865 crowns)
kva/dr/rtj
