Justice reform towards the last yes

Last week, in the Senate's Constitutional Affairs Committee, the second-reading examination of the justice reform bill began, which aims to amend the Constitution in order to introduce into our legal system not only the separation of careers between judges and prosecutors, but also the reform of the judiciary's self-governing body, with the splitting of the SCCM and the establishment of the new High Disciplinary Court.

A project strongly desired by the government and the majority forces, but opposed by the opposition and the judiciary. The parliamentary path has been accompanied by controversy, not least because the text of the government bill, presented in June last year by the Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, and the Minister of Justice, Carlo Nordio, appeared to be armoured: so much so that no amendments were approved. And now that the final parliamentary go-ahead is approaching, the organisational machine of the committees has started up in view of the referendum that will be held, in the intentions, next spring.

Si tratta infatti di una riforma costituzionale, che, per essere adottata, deve rispettare l’iter individuato dall’articolo 138 della Costituzione. È necessaria, intanto, una doppia deliberazione da parte sia della Camera sia del Senato, ad almeno tre mesi di distanza, e nella seconda votazione la proposta deve essere approvata a maggioranza assoluta dei componenti. Una volta pubblicata dovrà essere sottoposta a referendum popolare (se entro tre mesi lo richiedono un quinto dei membri di una Camera o 500mila elettori o cinque Consigli regionali). È un referendum confermativo, che non richiede che sia raggiunto il quorum per essere valido: perché la riforma passi sarà sufficiente che sia approvata dalla maggioranza dei voti validi, qualunque sia il numero dei votanti. Il referendum non si terrebbe, secondo la procedura di revisione costituz

The intention of the majority is to proceed swiftly, as Alberto Balboni (FdI), chairman of the Constitutional Affairs Committee and rapporteur of the bill, explains: 'I think we will finish the work in committee within this week or at the beginning of next week at the earliest. The final deliberation cannot, however, take place before 23 October'. In fact, it is necessary to wait three months from the first green light from the Senate, which arrived on 22 July.

So far, the path of the constitutional reform has been very rapid. But the future is still to be written. The referendum game, as of today, does not have a foregone conclusion. And in any case, the reform, even once approved, would not immediately change the structure of the judiciary, because the implementation phase would have to be opened. The bill itself provides that within a year of the reform coming into force, "the laws on the Superior Council of the Judiciary, on the judicial system and on disciplinary jurisdiction" should be aligned. In the meantime, the current provisions would have to continue to be applied.