New Polish judicial law does not meet all requirements to unlock funds, says EU Commission chief

A recently passed law reforming Poland’s disciplinary regime for judges – designed to resolve a rule-of-law dispute with Brussels and unlock billions in frozen EU funds – does not meet all of the European Commission’s requirements, says its president, Ursula von der Leyen.

At a press conference on Friday, von der Leyen noted that the commission has not yet completed a full assessment of the legislation, which was passed by parliament in May and signed into law by President Andrzej Duda in June.

However, she added that it is already possible to say that “this new law is not ensuring that judges are able to question the status of another judge without risking being subject to disciplinary offence. That is a requirement, that is needed”.

“So this issue still has to be addressed to comply with those commitments and therefore to unlock the first payment,” added the commission president.

von der Leyen’s remarks confirmed comments the previous day by her vice president, Věra Jourová, who said that Poland’s new law “does not fulful the milestones for the recovery plan”.

“Poland will have to reflect on the conditions, and if they will not have a sufficient response in the legally binding rules for the Polish judiciary, which will correspond with the milestones, we will not pay the money,” Jourová added.

Her remarks were immediately condemned by Beata Szydło – a former Polish prime minister and now ruling party MEP – who said they showed that “some members of the European Commission are looking for ways to block funds for Poland at all costs”.

Jourová and von der Leyen were referring to an agreement between the commission and the Polish government that sets out a number of so-called milestones which Poland has to meet in order to unlock around €36 billion in grants and loans from the EU’s Covid recovery funds.

The commission has made clear that the requirements include not only dismantling the disciplinary chamber for judges – as the newly passed legislation purports to do – but also more broadly reforming the disciplinary system and reinstating unlawfully dismissed judges.

Part of that disciplinary system is legislation introduced in 2020 – dubbed by critics the “muzzle law” – that allows judges to be punished – including the possibility to fire them – for refusing to accept the validity of judicial reforms and for questioning the status of other judges appointed under those reforms.

Shortly after that law was introduced, the European Commission launched infringement proceedings against Poland, with Jourová saying at the time that “there is a clear risk that…the disciplinary system for judges can be used for political control over the content of judicial decisions”.

Following last week’s remarks by von der Leyen and Jourová, Leszek Miller – another former prime minister and now opposition MEP – told TVN that they show “the prospect of an inflow of the first money is systematically receding”.

The current prime minister, Mateusz Morawiecki, however, downplayed such concerns. In an interview with Polska Times, he admitted that “the European Commission is delaying the transfer of these funds as much as it can” as the result of “dirty political games” by the opposition.

However, “the truth will come out and the EU funds will flow to Poland”, added Morawiecki, saying that he believes the first tranche of payments will arrive around the turn of the year.

Main image credit: European Parliament/Flickr (under CC BY 2.0)

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.