BEIJING ( Caixin Online) - China will ask state-owned enterprises (SOE) to contribute more of their profits to the government and allow more couples to have a second child, a key Communist Party document published by Xinhua says.
Three days after the third plenum of the party's 18th Central Committee ended, the state news agency published a 20,000-word document detailing decisions finalized at the closed-door meeting.
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The document lists 60 tasks for the party and says decisive results must be reached by 2020.
Party General Secretary Xi Jinping told the third full meeting of the 205-member Central Committee that it took seven months for a team headed by himself, party propaganda boss Liu Yunshan and Executive Vice Premier Zhang Gaoli to draft the decisions.
The seven-member Politburo Standing Committee held three deliberation sessions, the 25-member Politburo studied the decisions twice, and 'old comrades' were consulted, as were representatives from other parties and the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce. The latter is a body that serves as a bridge between private enterprise and the government.
'The key is to build an environment for fair competition, to enhance the vitality of society and the economy, to improve government efficiency and capability, to realize social justice and fairness, to push for social harmony and better the leadership and rule of the Communist Party,' Xi said.
The tasks cover a broad range of issues. They include having SOEs contribute 30% of their profits to the state so it can fund the social-welfare programs the public is increasingly demanding, and significant easing of the one-child policy. The change to family-planning policies in place since 1980 would allow families that had one parent who was an only child have a second baby.
The party also said it will scrap the labor-camp system, in which police can sentence people to detention without a court's involvement.
The changes would also see the judicial system revamped so that courts and prosecutors are controlled by a vertically managed system instead of by local governments.
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Under the category 'building a modern market' - one of the 60 rubrics the document was divided into - the party says it will give the market the right to set prices and push forward with changes to the pricing of water, natural gas, oil, electricity, transportation and telecommunications.
In terms of managing budgets and the relationship between the central and local levels of government, the document says Beijing's spending responsibilities should be enhanced.
The decision listed several changes aimed at improving the rule of law. It vows that the judicial system will be better supervised and the constitution will be better implemented. Moreover, experiments in separating local courts from the local government will be carried out in response to rampant interference in rulings by officials. The ruling Communist Party also pledged to increase the transparency of court proceedings.
The system of vertical management would also apply to prosecutors and party anti-corruption officials.
The document also sketches out a detailed plan for improving protection of the environment. Audits of officials leaving their posts will now include a component on the condition of natural resources and the environment during their tenure.
The list of decisions also said private institutions and companies should be encouraged to set up hospitals, doctors should be allowed to work in various hospitals, and medical insurance should be permitted to cover visits to private hospitals.
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