Justice referendum, Grosso president of the 'No' Committee. From Monday the majority's signature collection

After the final green light of the Senate on the justice reform with the separation of the careers of magistrates, the confrontation, indeed the clash, now shifts from the courtrooms to the streets and the media. Both the majority and the oppositions have announced that they intend to promote a confirmative referendum scheduled between March and April 2026.

The first to take action were the majority parliamentarians. Their collection of signatures to ask for a confirmatory referendum on the justice reform will begin next week. This step follows the formal request that the centre-right group leaders of the Chamber and Senate sent to their respective secretaries-general to activate the procedures and the consequent certification. 80 signatures will be needed for the deputies, equal to one fifth of the parliamentarians, 40 for the Senate. In the communication from the group leaders, the centre-right also indicated 3 deputies and 3 senators who will follow the procedures and will then go to deposit the signatures collected in the Supreme Court. In the Chamber they are Sara Kelany (FdI), Enrico Costa (FI) and Simona Matone (Lega) and in the Senate Marcello Pera (FdI), Erika Stefani (Lega) and Pierantonio Zanettin (FI).

The parliamentary groups of the PD, M5S and AVS also sent two letters, identical in text, to the Secretary General of the Chamber and the Secretary General of the Senate to start collecting signatures for the referendum request. The letters are signed by the groups' deputy vice-presidents Simona Bonafè, Carmela Auriemma and Marco Grimaldi for the Chamber, and Alfredo Bazoli, Alessandra Majorino and Tino Magni for the Senate

Enrico Grosso, presidente onorario del Comitato a difesa della Costituzione e per il No al referendum sulla riforma della Giustizia, promosso dall'Associazione nazionale magistrati (ANM), durante la conferenza stampa di presentazione, Corte di Cassazione, Roma 31 ottobre 2025. ANSA/FABIO FRUSTACI

In the meantime, the Committee for the 'no' vote to the referendum, promoted by the ANM, has been officially set up. A Committee created at the urging of magistrates but 'open to all, lawyers, professors and citizens; present in the territories, which does not intend to enter into political polemics but wants to explain to citizens the reasons for the 'no' vote to the reform'. Honorary chairman is Enrico Grosso, lawyer, professor of constitutional law at the University of Turin. "We are available with anyone as long as there is the widest possible debate, the interlocutors are all equally worthy of being involved, I hope for a confrontation with everyone, even with Prime Minister Meloni and the executive," said Grosso at the presentation of the Committee in the ANM headquarters in the Supreme Court in Rome.

There is no quorum for the confirmative referendum to be held in the spring. And Minister Carlo Nordio hoped that the campaign would not be "politicised" and that it would concern the "merit" of the reform. On the contrary, the Guardasigilli said he was ready for a TV confrontation with the ANM, inviting it to avoid "embracing" the oppositions, because it would be a "catastrophe" that would lead to the delegitimisation of the judges themselves.