At 16:10 on April 22, 2021 when the debate in the Plenary Session of the Parliament for the voting on the Code of Conduct Judicial Officers had already begun, an amendment (868/57 / 22-4-2021) that was both literally at the last minute, and also unrelated in content to the topic of the main bill, was submitted to the bill for the vote. This amendment was voted for exclusively by the members of the government (see the votes of the parties on page 72 of the minutes of the Parliament), and passed into law as Article 269 of law 4798/2021, in the chapter that concerns other urgent provisions.
Apart from the fact that in this case the rules of good legislation provided by the Constitution, Articles 87, 88 and 101 of the Rules of Procedure of the Parliament and the Manual of the Legislative Drafting Methodology for amendments were not observed, its substantive content raises further concerns about the violation of the rule of law.
With the submission of the text of the amendment at a time when the plenary session for the adoption of the law had already begun, there was no room for its examination or deliberation either by the public or by the MPs themselves, with all that that implies for the principle of transparency. The general exemption of members of committees advising the government on pandemic management from any criminal or civil responsibility, but also the exemption of these individuals from being questioned about their opinion or opinions expressed at the meetings, may be considered to infringe the principles of equality and proportionality but could also be seen as the executive overstepping into the jurisdiction of the justice system (which according to Article 26 of the Constitution belongs exclusively to the courts). One also reasonably wonders how a provision can be considered urgent, when it deals with issues for the management of a pandemic a whole year after its outbreak (see this article from the pressproject.gr)
The provision provoked strong reactions in the press (see, among others, e-tetRadio and Antigoni Michopoulou and Vangelis Triantis), as well as by the opposition during the parliamentary session (see Kathimerini), during which SYRIZA requested the withdrawal of this provision over concerns that it applied not only to the Scientific Committee of Infectious Diseases but also to governmental officials (see pp. 65-66 of the minutes of the Parliament as well as this article in Avgi).
As Costas Botopoulos (Constitutionalist, Lawyer) observes, although the judgment on whether or not a law is unconstitutional ultimately belongs to the courts (which will examine whether or not the principle of proportionality has been observed), from a moral-political point of view, such measures should be avoided as much as possible and only be used as a last resort. Although Botopoulos opines that the specific measure “could be justified due to this being an extremely charged and socially sensitive issue, as well as one that is subject to particularly extensive publicity, which involves a lot of misinformation,” the fact that such a measure is rushed to a vote as an amendment, in the way that it was, one year after the start of the pandemic, continues to raise concerns. (For other opinions both for and against the legality of the measure see 1, 2, 3, 4). Finally, concerns also arise as to what the prohibition on questioning members of the committees will mean in the event that either a prosecutorial inquiry or an investigation of the committee is conducted in the future, as it is possible that the committee members may not even be able to be called on as witnesses. (See this article by Gerasimos Livitsanos).
Both the Constitution and the Rules of Procedure of the Parliament as well as the Manual of Legislative Drafting Methodology prohibit the submission of overdue and irrelevant amendments in order to adhere to the principles of transparency and accountability.
Furthermore, in a state governed by the rule of law, we should all not only be considered but also be essentially equal before the law.
It is at least immoral (if not illegal) to discriminate as to how a particular group should be treated and to place disproportionate restrictions and exclusions in the course of justice.Both the procedure followed and the substance of this provision create multiple issues / doubts at the level of the rule of law, as analyzed in detail in the text.
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