Parliament accuses it of inaction because “countries that violate the rule of law cannot receive money from the EU”
Ursula von der Leyen’s team manages times that the European Parliament does not share. Suspicion of procrastination. For months it has been demanding an effective response against Hungary and Poland for those authoritarian drifts that have placed LGTBI rights, judicial independence or freedom of the press at the center of the bullseye. But it has been the ruling of the Constitutional Court of Warsaw, which annuls the primacy of European law by invalidating several key articles, which has filled the patience of the legislature. And what is coming is a rescaling of inter-institutional tensions with a lawsuit for inaction before the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU).
Last week, the MEPs of the Parliament’s Committee on Legal Affairs (Juri) recommended to President David Sassoli that he press the button to open a judicial procedure against the Brussels Executive for not having acted against countries that have been systematically failing to comply with the standards of the rule of law. Specifically for not having taken any step forward to turn off the tap of community funds. There is a Conditionality Regulation that protects the blocking of financing. It has been in force since last January 1; Hungary and Poland – who consider it arbitrary and without legal basis – have denounced it in the CJEU. And the European_Commission, to date, has only looked at it sideways. Thirteen votes in favor, three against and six abstentions supported Juri’s request to Sassoli. And this Wednesday most of the leaders of the political groups supported the initiative.
So the Italian, who continues to recover from pneumonia that will even prevent him from attending the European_ Council that starts today in Brussels, has already sent a letter to the legal services of the Chamber to get to work. ‘Member States that violate the rule of law should not receive EU funds. Last year, Parliament fought with all its might for a mechanism to guarantee this. However, until now the European Commission has been reluctant to use it, ”explained Sassoli in a communication.
Will retire if he acts
The four-paragraph letter emphasizes that idea. “This action against the Commission refers to the failure to act with respect to its obligations in the application of the Conditionality Regulation for the protection of the Union budget.” The claim would be withheld or withdrawn “only to the extent that the Commission formally triggers the procedure”. That is, at the moment in which the affected parties are formally notified in writing that the red light is turned on for them.
Here the European Parliament considers two specific situations ¬ aside from the evolution that may occur due to the important political burden of the matter. The first, the verdict of the High Court on the aforementioned appeal by Hungary and Poland, which is not expected until December. And the second (obvious) that the European Commission act. Here we must take into account the harshness of the messages that Von der Leyen addressed to the Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki in the face to face that they starred in on Tuesday in the Strasbourg plenary session.
“The Commission is carefully analyzing the ruling (of the Polish Constitutional Court) but I am deeply concerned because it calls into question the foundations of the EU and is a direct challenge to unity and to the European legal order, the only one that offers rights and certainty legal, in addition to mutual trust, “assured the German before warning Morawiecki that” we will act. He explicitly cited the conditionality mechanism that would leave Poland with at least 142 billion euros in the air.
Warsaw sneaks into the Council summit
“We will also address recent developments related to the rule of law during our working session.” It is the (vague) reference that the president of the European Council, Charles Michel, makes to the legal conflict with Poland in the invitation letter to the leaders for the summit that begins this Thursday in Brussels. The controversial issue enters with a shoehorn, on the first day of the meeting, despite the opposition of many countries (Spain among them) who fear that this conflict will end up “monopolizing” a Council that will have as its central issues the escalation in the prices of the energy and migration.
The point is that it is finally incorporated, but not formally, but rather as an apparent exchange of opinions with the intervention of some leaders and Mateusz Morawiecki himself, who would offer his version. Although already on Tuesday in the European Parliament he was inflexible in assuring that he would not accept “blackmail” with the financing and that the Constitution of his country “is above any other source of law.”
The European Parliament has pressed until the last moment for the European Council to deal with the matter. The main political groups demanded it this Wednesday during their interventions, demanding that the leaders “take a clear political direction on the issue of respect for the rule of law” by giving a boost to the Article 7 procedures (against Poland, but also against Hungary) , in a dead end for years and to the Conditionality Regulation itself.
In the last hours, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg have asked the European Commission to go beyond blocking Community funds to Budapest and Warsaw, considering that “the opening of an infringement procedure is obvious, but also insufficient.”
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