Reform of judicature
Since 1989 the judicature, regardless of the efforts of many ministers of justice, has been waiting for thorough reforms. The activities in this field to date, however, should be considered fragmentary. A fundamental problem that occurred was the fact that the prepared reforms were not based on comprehensive and thorough analysis of intended goals and potential results of the regulations. What is more, many reforms were dictated by, for example, current media events. The frequency of introducing subsequent amendments (especially in the scope of codification), no reflection on the actual reasons for the bad state of matters, ignoring achievements in other sciences or frequent changes of philosophy of judicature should also be mentioned. The outcome of all these problems is inefficiency of judicature bodies as far as human rights are concerned, which is indicated by numerous complaints lodged to state and international institutions, including the European Court of Human Rights. This resulted in a need for a programme which would devote its entire activity to the process of law-making, in order to supervise subsequent stages of legislative proceedings in a consistent and comprehensive manner, without being limited to participation in public consultations.
Monitoring of legislative proceedings
The main aim of the programme is observing and participating in current works initiated by state bodies in the field of reforms of judicature. It therefore assumes activity in the stage of public consultations, inter-departmental agreements, works undertaken in parliamentary committees and actions taken after passing a bill by the lower and upper houses of the Polish parliament (e.g. works of the President’s Chancellery and Constitutional Tribunal). Preparing stands to certain projects will be preceded by specially organised seminars or expert meetings with representatives of other non-governmental organisations, scientists, lawyer-practitioners, and their aim will be gathering knowledge – as broad as possible – and various opinions on the proposed regulation. However, due to wide range of legislative changes in the field of judicature, the monitoring activities will concentrate on selected bill drafts considered fundamental for the reform of judicature and for the protection of rights and freedoms of individuals. In principle, these will be the bills that fall within the competence of the Ministry of Justice. However, in order not to ignore other problems of judicature, the scope of interest will not exclude other proposals of legislative changes, which may lower the standard of human rights.
Policy papers
The Programme assumes preparing analyses in the form of so called policy papers, which show the effects of functioning of newly passed bills and introduced reforms, as well as demands concerning future changes. These analyses will be presented after the specified time of bill’s validity is over, and their aim will be: examining whether the assumptions accompanying the idea of creating a particular legal act were met, assessment of reform’s effectiveness and indicating potential necessity for further modifications of the law. The practice in the field of monitoring the legislative proceedings to date shows that the analysis of the level of realisation of legal act’s aims is usually omitted. Therefore, policy papers will be prepared on the basis of verification of correctness of legal regulations, doctrine, interviews with the stakeholders, analysis of court files and complaints on the functioning of a new bill. The effects of analyses will be presented during specially organised conferences with the participation of politicians, experts and practitioners who have influence on further shape of the regulation. These analyses are supposed to precede activities that lead to introduction of recommendations resulting from the policy papers.
Current monitoring of present legal problems
The last form of activity will be undertaking interventions in answer to complaints concerning the shape of the letter of the law. It will therefore be a method of providing support for particular persons – victims of malfunctioning judicature. The activities assume reaching a satisfactory solution in the form of general or systemic changes in judicature. Ultimately, these activities will concern lack or improper execution of judgements by the Constitutional Tribunal and the European Court of Human Rights. The choice of this particular sphere entails huge amount of work which is still required in Poland. First of all, the Programme assumes work on proper reinforcement of institutional mechanisms in this field.
The entire scope of works within the Project will be the subject of two evaluations by experts. It will be concluded with a conference, which will sum up its results, including observations and reservations concerning the participation of social organisations in the process of law-making and their influence on the legislative proceedings. The experience gathered during the Programme is supposed to influence the quality of law in the field of judicature, especially in the scope of human rights, and develop successful methods of monitoring the effects of changes introduced in the system of law.
* Artur Pietryka, coordinator of the “Monitoring of Legislative Proceedings in the Field of Judicature” Program, the Helsinki Foundation for Human Rights
