Draft laws passed by the Chamber of Deputies

Parliament in Bucharest has adopted a series of laws against the background of the coronavirus pandemic

Eugen Coroianu, 24.04.2020, 13:50

The
two chambers of the Romanian Parliament convened in a plenary session
on Thursday, a session which was attended by a lower number of Mps
though. There were also several phone interventions and the MPs
eventually
resorted
to electronic voting. The Chamber of Deputies, dominated by the
opposition Social-Democrats (PSD) passed as a decision-making forum
several draft laws to tackle the present crisis.

Among
this there was a PSD initiative to grant survivor’s benefits to the
families of doctors or other categories of medical personnel who lost
their lives while fighting the pandemic. So the surviving spouse and
children will be benefiting from survivor’s benefits amounting to
75% of the salary of the deceased member and in the absence of any
heir, parents of the deceased will get half of the survivor’s
benefit. The draft law was
passed
with landslide majority.

The
chamber passed amendments also proposed by the PSD to a government
ordinance under which bank installments can be postponed upon request
until December 31st.
The
amendments also provide for the elimination of the interest upon
interest for all types of credit. Even those with past-due accounts
can benefit from these provisions as well as the companies that
incurred 15% income loss due to the crisis. The ruling National
Liberal Party (PNL) has been accusing the Social-Democrats of
populism adding they will challenge these amendments at the
Constitutional Court.

The
Liberals say that under the new circumstances all debtors will be
applying for this
facility
and their credits will be considered risky. Now when bank resources
are more precious than ever, banks will have to block significant
amounts of money, which should have been pumped into the economy, a
Liberal MP has said. The PSD are defending their amendments arguing
that these are meant to help the population and the companies
affected by the crisis and that interest upon interest is applied
nowhere in the world.

The
chamber of Deputies has passed another law which provides for the
extension with another 6 months of the local authorities mandate from
the cessation of the state of emergency and also enables Parliament
to establish by means of an organic law the local election date.

Until
now that was established by the government, and the PNL have already
announced their intention to challenge the law at the Constitutional
Court. Prime Minister Ludovic Orban on Thursday said that local
election could be staged in September if the first peak of the
pandemic had passed by the end of July.

The
sooner the better says the Prime Minister adding that the
epidemiological situation
must
be taken into account. As for the Parliamentary election due in
December, Orban said that turnout can be increased by the
introduction of the postal voting in Romania as it is now in the
diaspora or the electronic voting. The Senate has also passed several
draft laws including that for granting more days off to those taking
care of children including during holidays, if schools and other
education units are closed down as a result of the state of
emergency.

(translated
by bill)