The failed reform of the Judiciary law stopped at the last minute by Pedro Sánchez in 2020 will be back on the table if a progressive coalition led by the PSOE is formed.
The measure, which is on the agenda of priorities of an eventual new government, pursues two objectives: to remove the Judiciary from the current deadlock situation, with the conviction that the PP will not yield and will keep the conservative members in place , whose mandate has expired for almost five years now and, secondly, to give a new incentive to the nationalist and pro-independence groups to get their support.
According to parliamentary sources, the Socialists are studying the possibility of rescuing the text by which it was intended to change the majorities to appoint members of the Judiciary.
This reform, on the one hand, would facilitate the renewal of the judges’ governing body, which has been in office since December 2018, and, on the other hand, would allow the entry of a member appointed by Junts and ERC.
With this maneuver, the PSOE would lose power within the Council, since what had been agreed with the PP – until the negotiations with Pablo Casado broke down and were not resumed with Alberto Núñez Feijóo – was to distribute to half the vowels (propose ten for each party).
These weeks, after the general elections of July 23, several proposals are being discussed to tempt the different groups. One of the bases is this reform, although, as these parliamentary sources explain, there is still “a lot of party” left, so there is time until the final proposal is finalized.
The plan that is being studied at the moment is the possibility of rescuing the reform that Unides Podemos proposed at the time so that, if in a first vote the majority of three fifths of Congress (210 deputies) necessary for to elect the twenty members of the CGPJ, the renewal could go ahead with an absolute majority (176 deputies) 48 hours after the first vote.
In this way, the functioning of the governing body of judges could be guaranteed with the twelve members elected by Congress and the Senate, even if the remaining eight appointed among lawyers and jurists could not be renewed, for the whose election the Constitution foresees a reinforced majority. This proposal was presented in October 2020, although Sánchez finally decided to withdraw it after Europe warned that the text presented could “violate” the anti-corruption standards set by the Group of States against Corruption of the Council of Europe (Greek).
Then, still with Pablo Casado as leader of the Popular, Sánchez announced that he was “stopping the clock” to try to negotiate the renewal of the Judiciary with the main opposition party. It had been two years since the body had expired due to the refusal of the PP to reach an agreement with the socialists under various pretexts.
A year later, in another joint proposal by Unides Podemos and the PSOE, the two formations carried out a partial reform to prevent the Council from continuing to appoint magistrates to the high courts while in office, in an attempt to force the PP to renew the organ, dominated by a conservative majority. However, not even the arrival of Núñez Feijóo at the head of the PP made it possible to sign an agreement, despite the fact that the names of the members had already been agreed upon since 2019.
Sánchez himself, in a letter sent to the leader of the PP on July 30, reminded him of the interruption of communication between the respective formations “abruptly and unilaterally with the breakdown of the pre-agreement for the renewal of the General Council of the Judiciary , a constitutional body of special relevance to our institutional system, which has been pending for more than four years”.
The “clock” that stopped three years ago is now set in motion again with two objectives: to achieve a renewal of the CGPJ and to seek support for Sánchez to be re-elected president of the government.
Regarding this, both parliamentary and Judiciary sources assume that with the current parliamentary arithmetic, the renewal of the body of judges is unfeasible, which will prolong the situation indefinitely if no action is taken.
Faced with the possibility of winning the elections and being able to be elected the new president of the government, Núñez Feijóo has remained throughout this time firm in his refusal to agree, claiming that before the renewal the law had to be reformed so that it is the judges and not the chambers that elect the twelve members coming from the judicial career.
Europe defends this reform – which also has the support of Vox – to strengthen judicial independence, although it has repeatedly reiterated that renewal is necessary first, and then reform.
