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Dl Sicurezza, 246,000 euro per year fund for lawyers who favour repatriations. The Cnf explodes: 'Never informed'

The decree allocates funds to pay lawyers who assist foreign citizens in applying for assisted voluntary return. The National Forensic Council raises the wall. And the Criminal Chambers attack: rule 'incompatible with the Constitution'

by Ivan Cimmarusti

18 April 2026

2' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

2' min read

Translated by AI

Versione italiana

The funds are already there. And they are written in black and white: 246 thousand euro for 2026 and 492 thousand euro per year for 2027 and 2028. Resources that can be used to pay lawyers 'with a mandate, who provide assistance to the foreign citizen in the phase of presenting the request to participate in an assisted voluntary repatriation programme'.

This is one of the most controversial points of the Security Decree approved by the Senate and to be examined by the Chamber of Deputies from Monday. A vote of confidence is expected on Wednesday for the final conversion of the measure wanted by Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi.

The standard that ignites the clash

What has caused the controversy to explode is above all Article 30-bis of the decree, which recognises a specific role for the National Bar Council in the procedure aimed at facilitating the repatriation of foreigners.

And it is precisely here that the toughest front opens up. Because the rule does not merely provide for the payment of lawyers, but directly involves a body that, according to the Cnf itself, was never notified.

The lunge of the National Forensic Council

The CNF's response came in a very harsh note: 'With regard to the provision of the security decree that gives the National Bar Council a role in the process of repatriating immigrants and in the management of payments to the lawyers involved, the CNF specifies that it was never informed of this involvement: neither before the amendment was tabled, nor during its parliamentary procedure, nor after its approval'.

A step that weighs politically and institutionally. Because the National Bar Council distances itself clearly from a procedure that the decree entrusts to it, denouncing that it has been kept completely out of the loop.

The issue of lawyers' fees

But the dispute does not stop at the lack of involvement of the CNF. At the centre of the clash is also the mechanism envisaged by the amendment: the lawyer's fee would only be triggered if the assisted foreign citizen applies for 'voluntary repatriation' and is actually repatriated.

And it is this point that has also ignited the reaction of criminal lawyers.

The Attack of the Criminal Chambers

The Council of the Union of Criminal Chambers also intervened in the controversy, rejecting without mincing words the provision inserted in the decree. The criticism is frontal: 'it is a provision incompatible with the Constitution and with the most elementary principles of forensic deontology: the lawyer cannot be paid to obtain the outcome desired by the State, but must assist his client in full freedom and independence'.

Words that move the clash to an even more delicate level: not only the management of funds or the role of the CNF, but the very relationship between defence, the lawyer's autonomy and the objective pursued by the state.

Ivan Cimmarustigiornalista
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Luogo: Roma
Lingue parlate: Italiano, inglese
Argomenti: Sicurezza, giudiziaria, inchieste, giustizia tributaria
Premi: Nel 2011 tra i vincitori del Premio Internazionale Antimafia Livatino-Saetta
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