Priorities of the New Parliament Session
Romanian Parliaments summer recess has ended, with its second ordinary session starting on September 1st.
Corina Cristea, 01.09.2017, 13:13
In Bucharest, where Parliament’s ordinary session has just started after the summer recess, the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies have to decide on bills that have been left in abeyance from previous sessions, on legislative initiatives submitted by MPs and on projects and ordinances coming from the Government. Senators will focus, among other things, on the citizens’ initiative to redefine the definition of family in the Constitution, passed by the Chamber of Deputies but not yet endorsed by the Senate.
Senate Speaker Calin Popescu Tariceanu said at the end of May that he referendum on the revision of the Constitution would be held this fall. Another priority of Parliament is to nominate two civil society representatives in the Higher Council of Magistracy. The procedure was initiated in November 2016 and resumed in March 2017 but the Senate has not yet made a decision in this respect.
The Chamber of Deputies is equally busy, as it has to tackle several bills that have been left pending from previous sessions. The most controversial one is the bill on pardoning certain crimes and the one on detention orders, silently adopted by the Senate. There are also the draft laws that have been green lighted by the Senate and are now pending debate in the Chamber of Deputies, such as increasing the VAT exemption threshold.
MPs must also decide on a series of ordinances and draft laws already adopted by the Government or pending adoption. One of them is the draft law regarding the Sovereign Development and Investment Fund that Prime Minister Mihai Tudose said would be discussed in Parliament in September. The project that brings changes to the laws regulating the judicial system, announced by Justice Ministry Tudorel Toader, which was submitted to the Higher Council of Magistracy for a consultative opinion on Thursday, will also be discussed by the MPs. Changes to the pensions’ law will also have to be approved by Parliament by October 1st.
A series of emergency ordinances, such as the one on capping special pensions, on capping the child raising allowance at nearly 1,900 euros per month, the 10% increase in police officers salaries and the 15% rise in the salaries of civilian personnel working with national security institutions, are also to be debated in Parliament. Adding to that is the Government ordinance on revising the Fiscal Code by gradually increasing excise duties on petrol and Diesel fuel. Last but not least, Parliament’s inquiry committee into alleged fraud at the 2009 presidential election is to present their report on September 8.
