"Twenty regions, primarily those with predominantly rural population, gave positive assessment of the bill", he said.
According to him, only two regions including the Astrakhan region and Yakutia spoke out against the privileges monetarization.
"As to the large cities, including Moscow and Saint Petersburg, they have ambiguous assessment", emphasized the Federation Council's speaker.
Mironov spoke for securing the government's obligations on timely readjustment of the privileges in the final version of the law.
"The main thing is not to make people feel worse and to provide the social mandate", he noted.
According to Mr. Mironov, the Federation Council, as the region's chamber, will primarily advocate the interests of the federation's constituents (totalling 89).
"The regions should receive the promised assets to cover the privileges from the federal budget to the full extent. Indeed, if there is no well-considered mechanism of implementing the law and taking into account the interests of the persons entitled to the privileges, the social protest will go up", he stated.
The Federation Council's speaker said that the upper chamber had already established a working group that would prepare its own amendments package to the bill before the second reading in the State Duma. The group is composed of chairmen of the Federation Council's profile committees, members of the government, presidential administration and State Duma.
"We want to lay down our proposals and amendments and prepare a measured, reasoned position on this law", Mr. Mironov said.
