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PRESIDENT REFERS POLISH GOVERNMENT’S BUDGET TO CONSTITUTIONAL COURT DUE TO
“DOUBTS” OVER LEGALITY

Jan 31, 2024 | Business, Law, Politics

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President Andrzej Duda has announced that he is sending the government’s budget
for 2024 to the Constitutional Tribunal (TK) for assessment due to his “doubts”
as to whether it was adopted properly due to the exclusion from parliament of
two opposition MPs recently jailed for abuse of power.

While Duda also signed the budget – something he could have refused to do while
awaiting a TK ruling – his decision nevertheless adds to the political and legal
chaos Poland has witnessed since a new government came to power last month. It
has regularly clashed with Duda, an ally of the former ruling Law and Justice
(PiS) party.

Yesterday, Prime Minister Donald Tusk warned that, if the budget was not
approved, the ruling coalition may seek to call new elections. But this evening
he noted that, because the president has signed the budget as well as sending it
for further assessment, it can go into force in the meantime.



Earlier this month, the ruling majority in both chambers of parliament – the
Sejm and Senate – voted in favour of accepting the government’s budget for 2024.

It then passed to the president for his approval. Unlike with other legislation,
the president is not allowed to veto the main budget bill. However, he can refer
it to the TK if he has doubts about the constitutionality of the entire bill or
any of its provisions.

That is what Duda has done, with his office announcing this afternoon that the
decision was made “due to doubts related to the correctness of the procedure for
adopting the [budget] bills, i.e. the inability of MPs Mariusz Kamiński and
Maciej Wąsik to participate in the work of the Sejm on these bills”.



Kamiński and Wąsik are PiS politicians and former government ministers who last
month received binding convictions and two-year prison sentences for abuse of
power. They were jailed this month but, two weeks later, were pardoned by Duda.

Kamiński and Wąsik were also stripped of their mandates as members of the Sejm,
the lower house of parliament, as happens when MPs are sentenced to prison.
However, they, PiS and Duda argue that that should never have happened because
the president had previously pardoned them in 2015 before the final ruling.

The legitimacy of the 2015 pardons – and therefore of Kamiński and Wąsik’s
status as MPs – is, however, under legal dispute. One chamber of the Supreme
Court has ruled that the 2015 pardons were issued illegitimately.

But another chamber of the Supreme Court and the TK have effectively ruled that
the 2015 pardons are legitimate. Both that chamber and the TK are seen as being
under the influence of PiS and their legitimacy has also been rejected by Polish
and European court rulings.



In response to Duda’s decision today, Tusk tweeted that “the budget is signed
and that’s all that matters. The rest is meaningless. The money will go to the
people, nothing can stop it”.

Yesterday, amid rumours that Duda would not sign the budget, Tusk had warned
that if the president “tried in any way to block the payment of people’s
salaries, we together with our coalition partners may decide to cut short the
parliamentary term…which would lead to early elections”.

Today, after Duda had announced his decision, the head of Tusk’s chancellery,
Jan Grabiec, ridiculed the idea of sending the budget to the TK “because
criminal MPs convicted by a court and imprisoned could not take part in the
vote. Does President Duda believe [parliamentary] voting buttons should be
installed in cells?”

However, in its statement today, Duda’s office warned that the president will
take “similar action each time MPs are prevented from exercising their mandate”.
That suggests he could refer all legislation passed by parliament without the
participation of Kamiński and Wąsik to the TK.




Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and published by an
independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our
readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.




Main image credit: Marek Borawski/KPRP

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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.






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PAULINA OLSZANKA

Solutions journalism project manager
 
 Paulina  is a journalist and writer with a background in anthropology, social
theory & political economy. She has worked for Fairfax Media, the Polish Press
Agency, the Guardian and De Volkskrant
 
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AGATA GOSTYŃSKA-JAKUBOWSKA

advisory board member

Senior Research Fellow at the Global Europe Centre, University of Kent.

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WERONIKA STRZYŻYŃSKA

contributing editorial assistant 

Weronika Strzyżyńska is currently studying journalism at Goldsmiths as a Scott
Trust Bursary recipient. She  has written on issues immigration and Brexit for
New Statesman and Prospect

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AGNIESZKA WĄDOŁOWSKA

managing editor

Agnieszka Wądołowska is managing editor of Notes from Poland. She has previously
worked for Gazeta.pl and Tokfm.pl and contributed to Gazeta Wyborcza, Wysokie
Obcasy, Duży Format, Midrasz and Kultura Liberalna”

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JULIETTE BRETAN

contributing writer

Juliette Bretan is a freelance journalist covering Polish and Eastern European
current affairs and culture. Her work has featured on the BBC World Service, and
in CityMetric, The Independent, Ozy, New Eastern Europe and Culture.pl.

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DANIEL TILLES

editor-in-chief

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland and assistant professor of
history at the Pedagogical University of Krakow. He has written on Polish
affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO
Europe, The Independent and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.

ARTICLES BY THIS AUTHOR

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STANLEY BILL

founder, editor-at-large

Stanley Bill is the founder and editor-at-large of Notes from Poland.
He is also Senior Lecturer in Polish Studies and Director of the Polish Studies
Programme at the University of Cambridge, where he works on Polish culture,
politics and history.

Stanley has spent more than ten years living in Poland, mostly based in Kraków
and Bielsko-Biała. He founded Notes from Poland in 2014 as a blog dedicated to
personal impressions, cultural analysis and political commentary. He is
committed to the promotion of deeper knowledge and understanding of Poland.

He is the Chair of the Board of the Notes from Poland Foundation.

ARTICLES BY THIS AUTHOR

 

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MARIA WILCZEK

deputy editor

Maria Wilczek is deputy editor of Notes from Poland. She also contributes
regularly to The Economist and Al Jazeera, and has also written for The
Times, Politico Europe, The Spectator and Gazeta Wyborcza. She was previously
Marjorie Deane fellow at The Economist in London (2018) and a business
consultant at the Boston Consulting Group in Warsaw. Maria is a graduate of the
University of Oxford and a student at the Polish School of Literary Reportage.
 
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BEN KOSCHALKA

assistant editor

Ben Koschalka is a translator and the assistant editor at Notes from Poland.
Originally from Britain, he has lived in Kraków since 2005.

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NORMAN DAVIES

advisory board member

UNESCO Professor at the Jagiellonian University and Professor Emeritus at
University College London



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TIMOTHY GARTON ASH

advisory board member

Professor of European Studies at Oxford University

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ANDRZEJ NOWAK

advisory board member

Professor at the Institute of History of the Jagiellonian University

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SHANA PENN

advisory board member

Executive Director of Taube Family Foundation

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PAWEŁ KOWAL

advisory board member

Associate Professor at the Institute of Political Studies of the Polish Academy
of Science, member of the Polish parliaments

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OLGA TOKARCZUK

advisory board member

Author, winner of 2018 Nobel Prize in Literature 

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SIOBAN DOUCETTE

author

Siobhan Doucette is a historian whose work focuses the opposition movement in
Communist Poland. Her first book, Books Are Weapons: The Polish Opposition Press
and the Overthrow of Communism, is available from University of Pittsburgh
Press. It focuses on the Polish independent publishing movement from 1976 to
1989.  
 

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