Session of a Public Council by RusAccreditation held

On September, 23 of the year 2016 a session of a Public Council by the Federal Service for accreditation has been held. Deputy Minister of Economic Development of Russian Federation Savva SHILOV participated in the session. Mister SHILOV emphasized a high quality of the work of Public Council members and importance of tasks addressed by the Service. According to the Minister, this area of activities is one of the most important for the Ministry of Economical Development as well.

While greeting the audience, Head of the Federal Service for accreditation Aleksey KHERSONTSEV declared that he had held the meetings with Chief Executives of four constantly acting Committees by the Public Council and he sees a huge potential for implementation of methodological materials developed by them in practical activities of the Service.

The Chairman of a Public Council Vladimir SALAMATOV reminded that the primary goal of a Public Council is assistance to the Federal Service for accreditation in construction and deployment of a state policy in the area of accreditation. Besides, mister SALAMATOV announced extensive agenda of a session.

Examination of a public Declaration of Goals and Objectives of the Federal Service for accreditation for the years 2016-2018 was the first item of agenda. The document, developed within the framework of introduction of a system of administration of the Federal Service for accreditation in accordance with adopted Policy in the Area of Quality, was approved by the Public Council unanimously.

Traditionally, representatives of different reference groups are engaged in discussion of prior goals and objectives of the Service for the sake of their subsequent citation in the Declaration. Thus, on June 8, 2016 a meeting with the participation of concerned members of a Public Council by the Federal Service for accreditation and representatives of expert society was held. In the course of a meeting the project of Declaration of Goals and Objectives of the Federal Service for accreditation for the years 2016-2018 was improved with the consideration of all received suggestions.

Finally 11 prior goals in the area of quality, directed at securing of credibility to the results of activities of accredited persons were introduced in the Declaration.  9 key goals for their implementation were defined.

In comparison with publicly declared traditional goals of the Service for the year 2015 (securing of neutrality, transparent activities of RusAccreditation, securing of development of standardisation in the area of accreditation and correspondence assessment, enhancement of the quality of state services and the like), the list of goals for the coming 2 years has been expanded.

Further important directions of activities until the year 2018 shall be securing of confirmation of accreditation in the national system abroad, adoption of governing documents of international organisations for accreditation IAF and ILAC, securing of efficiency and fruitfulness of control over activities of accredited persons and removal of unjustified administrative barriers, as well as facilitation of development and improving of educational system and training of personnel in the area of accreditation and correspondence assessment, including experts on accreditation in accordance with the requirements of a standard ISO 19011.

Deputy Head of the Federal Service for accreditation Sergey MIGIN told about introduction of alterations in regulatory legal acts in the area of accreditation. The projects of amendments in regulatory legal acts were developed following the results of analyses of a law enforcement practice  in compliance with the list of key events of a priority project by the Ministry of Economical Development of Russian Federation «Introduction of efficient system of accreditation in accordance with international standards», adopted by an order of the Ministry of Economical Development of Russian Federation from February 28, 2014 № 97, in the purpose of further improvement of functioning of national accreditation system, among such harmonisation of regulatory legal acts with requirements of international organisations - International Organisation on Accreditation of Laboratories (ILAC), and International Accreditation Forum (IAF).

The following amendments should be introduced in the Federal Law 412-FZ «On accreditation and the national accreditation system»:

• Increasing of the term of removal of discrepancies, revealed following to on-site assessment within the framework of a governmental accreditation service, from 20 to 40 days.
• Establish the possibility of contraction of accreditation area in the case of complete arrest of accreditation and deficient removal of exposed discrepancies with criteria of accreditation
• Set out that the presence of knowingly false statements in conclusions of experts would stipulate sufficient ground for their disqualification by a legal procedure for the term of 3 years or less.
• Specify contents of a notion «conflict of interests» in relation to activities of experts in the area of accreditation and other amendments.

Amendments in the Federal Law 184-FZ «On technical administration» should specify that the term of validity of certificate of conformity, acquired in the national system GOST R, must be calculated since the day of introduction of its details in the corresponding register. Besides, in the case of discrepancies between certificate details, specified in the register, and details in the paper medium, priority should be given to details in the register.

One of the items of agenda were explicit reports of chairmen of committees on the results of work of structural divisions of a Public Council throughout the year. These structural divisions are among others represented by employees of certification bodies, testing laboratories (centres), organizations and private entrepreneurs, accredited in the area of securing of uniformity of measurements, and accreditation experts.

The Head of Committee on activities of testing laboratories (centres) Olga NIKITINA told about performed activities on compilation of suggestions, directed at improvement of regulatory legal acts that regulate the area of accreditation. She also described the questions in connection with practical activities of testing laboratories. Thus, one year ago a working team on  interlaboratory comparing testing was established with the support of RusAccreditation. «We managed to resolve numerous practical issues that aren’t critical as of the day any more»,- Olga NIKITINA said. Thus, for example, 5 testing laboratories arranged in their own effort interlaboratory comparing testing in one of the most complicated areas - mechanical engineering, enabling participants to provide corresponding data for introduction in the unified register of a Customs Union. «Numerous laboratories registered for participation in international comparing testing, including under the aegis of APLAC, and we already have provisional results of this testing», - Head of Committee reported.  Moreover, Olga NIKITINA stressed the necessity of promotion of the work on development of methodical recommendations   on performance of on-site expertise of activities of accredited testing laboratories within the framework of the procedure of competence confirmation, suggesting expanding the scope of experts, participating in this process.

The Head of Committee on activities of enterprises and private entrepreneurs, accredited in the area of securing the uniformity of measurements Vladimir OKREPILOV pointed out international recognition of Russian accreditation system as the principle objective, faced by RusAccreditation. One of the basic criteria of international recognition of Russian system is securing of traceability of measurements. Committee has performed a spacious work in this direction in coordination with Federal Agencyon Technical Regulating and Metrology and RusAccreditation on the basis of provisions of «Declaration of metrological traceability», signed by International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM), International organisation on regulatory metrology (OIML), International cooperation on accreditation of laboratories (ILAC) and International Organization for Standardization (ISO).  This document defines the role of national metrological institutions and accredited laboratories in this process and recommendations to secure traceability. Besides, Committee participated in development of a project «The policy of RusAccreditation on traceability of measurement results».

Head of Committee on activities of accredited bodies Aleksey SHALIN expressed his opinion on the direction, in which improvement of the institute of accreditation is necessary. We should shift the focus away from administration to strengthening methodologies. «We need to move on to other evaluation criteria, the future lies with accreditation schemes, because not every specialist can implement a certain assessment scheme», - he explained.

The Head of Committee on activities of accreditation authorities Sergey KREININ emphasized importance of a problem, connected to neutrality and independence of accreditation experts. One of the main objectives of Committee in the course of a year was development of a code of ethics of accreditation experts in the national system. The project of documents was presented to the members of a Public Council.

In his turn the Head of the Federal Service for accreditation asked representatives of committees to examine the matter and to express their opinion on necessity of supplementing accreditation criteria by the list of documents in the area of standardisation (corresponding national and international standards) that administer procedural matters of activities of accredited persons.  

Report on the work of a Federal governmental information system in the area of accreditation (FGIS RusAccreditation) was presented by a Deputy Head of Department-Head of Information Technology Division of the Federal Service for accreditation Yuri BUTENKO.

Every year FGIS RusAccreditation processes more than 30 000 000 information inquires from the registers of a service, delivered by the means of a Unified Website of Public Services and official Website of a Service. In the course of a year 2015 the applicants registered in a «non-paper form» (without application in certificating bodies) more than 19000 conformity declarations via the service of electronic registration of declarations. In the present period FGIS RusAccreditation provides the possibility of filing application for delivery of 4 public services:

• accreditation,
• confirmation of a competence of accredited person,
• expansion of an area of accreditation,
• introduction of amendments in the entry of accredited person in  a corresponding register due to alteration of a place of activity of such person.

More than 300 applications for provision of public services have been filed in a non-paper mode. However, a series of organizational issues had to be solved in connection with launching of public services in FGIS RusAccreditation, among such the issues of interaction between accreditation experts and the corresponding Directorate. 

RusAccreditation has started an active phase of construction of prospective form of a system - FGIS RusAccreditation 2.0. The closest plans include the following:

• implementation of  a possibility of practical application of risk-oriented approaches by the provision of public services and performance of oversight functions,
• revision of internal system architecture with due regard to requirements of import phase-out,
• improvement of mechanisms of interdepartmental electronic interaction and open data.

Substantial attention will be paid to improvement of ergonomic performance of FGIS RusAccreditation.