Polish president offers compromise in court stand-off with Brussels

Polish president Andrzej Duda has presented a plan to abandon a controversial judicial body, hoping to end a stand-off with Brussels that is costing Warsaw €1 million in daily fines.

Mr Duda said on Thursday he would submit to parliament a Bill to disband a controversial supreme court chamber set up to discipline judges and viewed by the European Commission as a breach of EU law.

“I am proposing that this chamber is dissolved,” said Mr Duda, saying that Poland could not afford a row with the European Commission given the growing tensions in neighbouring Ukraine. “Poland needs peace now and, given the tense international situation, we must stand together as a united force.”

Ahead of its final ruling on the chamber, the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ordered Poland to suspend the body’s operations. When nothing happened, the court agreed last October to fines of €1 million a day until Warsaw followed its order.

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Poland’s ruling national conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party has attacked the fine as “blackmail”, ratcheting up a long-running stand-off over reforms that critics say undermine the independence of Polish courts and judicial appointments.

Leading opposition figures and judges see new appointments procedures and bodies as part of a concerted effort to create a body of judges that are allies of, or beholden to, the ruling party.

Judicial independence

In an interim ruling last year, CJEU judges said the disciplinary chamber – which can single out, suspend, move or fire judges over their rulings – was “potentially capable of undermining the principles of the irremovability of judges and judicial independence”.

Such measures could be used as “a way of exercising control over the content of judicial decisions” and, given their potential to affect the life and career perspectives of a judge, “have effects similar to those of a disciplinary sanction”.

Mr Duda’s proposal would replace the existing chamber with a new, broader “chamber for professional responsibility” headed by 11 new judges. The disciplinary chamber judges could apply to be reassigned to another chamber of the supreme court or retire.

Despite protest from Warsaw, European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen has insisted that rolling back the disciplinary chamber is key for Poland to access billions of euro from the EU’s Covid-19 recovery fund.

This is the second time that Mr Duda, a PiS ally and appointee, has stepped in to resolve political stand-offs. In late December he vetoed a Bill, previously passed by parliament, that would have forced US media group Discovery to give up its controlling stake in private Polish broadcaster TVN.

PiS framed its Bill to block non-European majority ownership of Polish broadcasters as a move to block disinformation and fake news; opponents saw a targeted campaign against a vocal consistent government critic.

Mr Duda said he shared the government’s concern about foreign media ownership but, given the international outcry over freedom of speech and the risk of damage to Poland’s business reputation, he said such a move was “for the future”.