On The Control Of Discretion Of Administrative Punishments In The Field Of Quality And Technical Supervision

The exercise of discretion is very common when quality and technical supervision departments make decisions on administrative punishments. However, as the existing mechanisms of the control of discretion do not work well, the abuse of discretion of administrative punishments is very serious:fine or forfeiture is inappropriate to be applied; the party is punished more severe or lighter than he should be; the standards of identification of the seriousness of illegal acts are not uniform; avoid application of general procedures; the time limit of acts is unreasonably prolonged and so on. The abuse of discretion of administrative punishments is not only against the legitimate interests of the private party, but also easily leads to corruption of law enforcement officials, damages the image of the Government, increases the difficulty of law enforcement, even undermines social stability and obstructs the rule of law. There are many reasons for the abuse of discretion of administrative punishments. Too large room of discretion is an objective reason. The low overall quality of law enforcement officials is a subjective reason. Besides, to pursue interests is also a driving factor and even it is fueled by the private party. Sometimes, it is also the result of local protectionism. In order to effectively control the discretion of administrative punishments, pre-control, process control and post-supervision must be carried out. The content of pre-control is to set up discretion standards of administrative punishments. The content of process control is to improve the withdrawal system, the system of separating function, the collegiate system, the reasons-giving system, and the hearing system. The content of post-supervision is to perfect the administrative review system and the evaluation of quality system. Pre-control, process control and post-supervision form a strong integrated network of controlling the discretion of administrative punishments.