Evident groundlessness constitutional complaint

Grounds of constitutional complaints admissibility have in majority formal character. According to article 77.3.3 The Constitutional Tribunal Act of 25 June 2015, the Tribunal shall issue a decision on refusal to proceed with an application of a constitutional complaint, if an application or a constitutional complaint are manifestly unfounded. Evident groundlessness is constitutes a substantial requirement od admissibility. Since it has a character of a general clause, its meaning is determined in the process of application of law. Any doubts whether the complaint is evidently groundless, should result with its consideration in regular proceedings, and full examination of its legitimacy. The possibility of the substantive examination of complaints grounds, at the preliminary stage has an exceptional character, and should be given restrictive interpretation. The practice based on the opposite assumption could change constitutional complaints role as a remedy for constitutional rights and freedoms infringement.

The article focuses on the analysis of objective scope of right to put forward a constitutional complaint. Of particular imprtance, for this issue, is the function of constitutional complaint. It is an instrument of human rights protection. Due to the brevity of statutory and constitutional regulation of this problem, Constitutional Tribunal had to determine this aspect of its activity. It is glaringly obvious that individuals are the biggest group of complainants because constitutional rights inhere mainly to a natural person. It is crucial that constitutional complaint is a guarantee of exactly that entitlements. Disputes have arisen with the granting a proactive complainants legitimation for collective bodies, especially public ones.

On June 23rd, 2016, the United Kingdom (UK) held an EU-Referendum which resulted in a vote in favor of withdrawing from the European Union (EU). However, in a post-referendum reality, several constitutional issues have become apparent. On one hand, it is not certain whether the Prime Minister, under the royal prerogatives, can trigger Art. 50 of the EU Treaty. On the other hand, the scope of Westminster’s approval must still be determined. It is believed that the judiciary will end up in a constitutional crisis, especially the Supreme Court. At the very least, the suspension of ‘Brexit’ procedures is causing uncertainty on both sides i.e. UK and EU. This paper will pose some of the essential questions being discussed on the eve of the Supreme Court’s decision over ‘Brexit’ in December of 2016/January of 2017.

Memers of Parliament are together with Sejm in pleno, and parliamentary commissions, one of the entities entitled to control widly understood states government, which consists of: the Counsil of Ministers in gremio, Primeminister, other members of the Counsil of Ministers, as well as central and local organs of governmental administration. The purpose of this work is an analysis of members of Parliament position as parliamentary control entities, according to normative regulations, in particular provisions of Constitution. The above mentioned position consists of following elements: 1) general status of deputy determined by two groups of features: a) in general by position of Sejm in the system of govering bodies in the Republic of Poland, and concept of relation of deputies to electors, b) on the detailed ground by normative acts regulations – The Constitution of The Republic of Poland of 2nd April 1997, Act on performance of deputy, and senators mandate, Sejms regulation; 2) subjective, and objective scope of deputies rights to control governments activity, which is identical with subjective, and objective scope of such control determined in art. 95 of 1997 Constitution; 3) institutions remaining in deputies disposal which aim is control, which are: a) deputies interpellations, b) deputies questions, deputies questions in ongoing matters, d) information in ongoing matters.

The article discusses the scope of legal responsibility on the part of The President of the Republic of Poland. The lack of precise legal regulations concerning the matter in question leads to the following conclusion: taking into consideration the present prohibitionof implicit immunity the President of the Republic of Poland ought to share the same realm of legal responsibility as do other Polish citizens. Yet, due to the apparent dangers inherent in the execution of the legal responsibility the author proposes for the jurisdiction in question to be under the supervision of the State Tribunal. The author’s argument is founded on the present legal order as well as in numerous functional and language oriented factors. As a consequence, the author claims “the offense” as defined in the 145th article of the Constitution is in reality a general notion for criminal responsibility.

The article presents selected line of jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court with regard to judgments referring to the reliability and efficiency of public institutions. The principle indicated in its title was expressed by Polish constitutional lawmaker in the preamble to the Polish Constitution of 1997. In the introduction, there are identified various positions of doctrine regarding the normative character of the preamble. Due to the lack of a legal definition the author defines the concept of “fairness” and “efficiency”, and “the integrity of the state” and “the efficiency of the state”. This article in its essential part takes into account judgements of the Constitutional Tribunal issued in 2006–2016. Adopted timing is determined by the judgement oth the Tribunal passed in 2006, where the principle of fairness and efficiency has been called the “principle” and where the Court recognised its normative charcter. The judgments are discussed in chronological order. The aim of this article is to show the substantial meaning of the principle of fairness and efficiency of the state which was provided in discussed court cases. The idea is also to draw attention to the Introduction to the Constitution as its important part.

The text contains description and analysis of changes of 2006 and 2009 in the Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany concerning legislative powers and financial relations of federation and länder. The text begins with a description of advancing for over 50 years “process of policies’ merging”, described already in seventies of 20th century as a “trap”. Therefore, it was important to try to resolve the problem by two large amendments of the German constitution in 2006 and 2009 (i.e. the 1st and the 2nd reforms of federalism). The author describes assumptions and instruments applied by the first reform, ie. strengthening of legislative competences of the Union and länder, reducing the number of cases towards which the Bundesrat may apply the absolute veto, limiting so-called “mixed funding”, making “blocking up” of the Union and the countries through new regulation of matters more difficult by requiring the approval of the Bundesrat, as well as the adjustment of the Basic Law to the challenges of membership of Germany in the European Union. In this context the second reform of federalism was also the subject of analysis. The reform amended the system of mutual financial relations of the Union and countries and introduced a so-called “debt brake” (Schuldenbremse) but also limited some solutions which had been introduced three years before.

Local self-government in the Republic of Belarus is an institution of constitutional law. It declares functioning of institutions of direct and indirect democracy. The aim of following paper is to describe legal aspects of institutions of direct democracy in the system of local self-government in Belarus including local referendum, local assembly and territorial social self-government. It discusses also problems in implementation of direct democracy mechanisms, relating this with the specificity of nondemocratic political regime in contemporary Belarus.

The problem of capitals is often marginalized however, not always regulations referring to capitals are clearly defined. The constitution of Spain allows the autonomous regions (which the country is divided into) to designate their capitals themselves. Most regions regulate the problem of capitals in their Statue of Autonomy, or refers to other resolutions of the local parliament. Often the term “capital” is not used. Instead, the city that will host the autonomy institution is indicated. In most cases there is no doubt about the city which should hold the capital function in the autonomy. However there are exceptions to this rule. For example in Galicia a serious conflict took place in course of designation of the capital. The same is still happening in Castilla and León. This autonomy, as well as The Basque Country, has no clear regulation regarding to the capital city, which is the cause of many local political crises.