Proposition 50K0990

Projet de loi modifiant l'article 20 de la loi du 7 mai 1999 modifiant le Code judiciaire en ce qui concerne le régime disciplinaire applicable aux membres de l'Ordre judiciaire.

General information ¶

Author

Open Vld Hugo Coveliers

Submission date

Nov. 29, 2000

Official page

Visit

Status

Adopted

Requirement

Simple

Subjects

administrative sanction judicial power disciplinary proceedings

Voting ¶

Voted to adopt

Groen Ecolo PS | SP Open Vld MR

Voted to reject

CD&V FN VB

Abstained from voting

N-VA

Party dissidents ¶

• Richard Fournaux (MR) voted to reject.
• Alfons Borginon (Open Vld) abstained from voting.

Contact form ¶

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Discussion ¶

Dec. 21, 2000 | Plenary session (Chamber of representatives)

Full source

I am referring to my written report.

Mr. Speaker, colleagues, I will be brief because we have also received the pressure sample, which is in accordance with the discussion in the committee. What is it about? There was a bill proposed by Mr. Bourgeois aiming to address the problem arising from the lack of control over the police service, which is launched from 1 January, because there was no supervision of the magistracy. The cause of the problem was that the federal prosecutor’s bill could not be approved before the end of this year, resulting in the absence of a federal prosecutor’s office, the federal police would be set up without the supervision of the magistracy. Mr. Bourgeois had submitted a bill aimed at appointing the national magistrates to oversee this federal police. The Government had submitted an amendment here in the Chamber that would appoint not the national magistrates but magistrates designated by the Ministers of Justice and Home Affairs for this supervision. This was approved by the majority in this House.

Mr. Speaker, I only note that the Justice Committee is still meeting at this time. I propose that the general discussion be opened if the members of the committee are present here.

Mr. Speaker, I will be brief. This communication can also be considered as accountability for my voting behavior later. Colleagues, this is another vote that we will have to hold all the way to modulate the entry into force of a number of laws that are important for the functioning of the judiciary. This law is the result of important discussions in the Dutroux committee and other parliamentary investigation committees. We had to repeat again and again that, in the absence of good disciplinary law, every debate about the functioning of the court and about the quality of justice did not get any grip on the reality.

During the previous legislature, we have all passed a new disciplinary law with great enthusiasm, precisely to implement all the recommendations of all those investigative committees. Once again, the entry into force of such a recommendation should be postponed. We had one and a half years to prepare for this. However, it should not have been. It would be interesting if we could show the media and the public opinion how it has been improvised here in the Justice Committee and in the plenary session in recent weeks to correct the proposals. Our group will not support this proposal with great conviction.

Colleagues, Mr Van Parys is so kind to report stante pede, on a not so easy matter. I ask you to listen to him. If you have no time or desire to do so, please leave the room.

Mr. Van Peel, you are somewhat right. I will wait, but when I look at the text, I think that this will not be a problem. There were no insurmountable difficulties in the committee. I will take this back in hand later.

General discussion is closed. The general discussion is closed.

Thank you, Mr President. I think that the government and the majority should know what service they are given here through the intervention and benevolence of the opposition in these. I will submit a very critical comment on the substance of the case.

Therefore, it was approved in this Chamber that magistrates, appointed by the Ministers of Justice and Home Affairs, would oversee this federal police. The case was then transmitted to the Senate and there an amendment was approved in which not the Ministers of Justice and Home Affairs would designate these magistrates, but in which this would be done through a ministerial decision consulted in the Council of Ministers. As a result of the approval of this amendment, it became necessary for us to discuss in the Chamber this bill, which has since become a bill. The subject of the discussion was clear and sharp in the committee. The opposition clung to the bourgeois bill that stated that this should initially be the national magistrates, or at least magistrates under the supervision of the College of Attorneys-General. The majority’s statement was that these could perfectly be magistrates who fall under the authority of the Ministers of Justice and Home Affairs, defending the amendment that had been approved in the Senate, namely that this would be done through a ministerial decision consulted in the Council of Ministers. It is this amendment or the draft as approved by the Senate that obtained a majority in the Justice Committee of this Chamber. Mr. Bourgeois’s amendments aimed at placing these magistrates under the supervision of the College, but they were rejected.

So far a verbal report on the discussions in the committee and I would very much like to briefly clarify the position of the CVP group.

I am referring to my written report.

I sincerely thank you for your report, Mr Van Parys. You have the word now as a member of your group.

Mr. Speaker, dear colleagues, we must be aware of the special importance of this dossier. Yesterday — it was actually last night — I told the four or five remaining colleagues at this tribune that from January 1 the new federal police will enter, from a democratic point of view, irresponsible circumstances. I have just made it clear to you that the majority of this Chamber has given the Government a power to freely dispose of the federal police budget. There will therefore no longer be any budget control from Parliament on the 47 billion francs, which are the resources of the federal police. It will be possible to make shifts within this budget without any intervention of the House of Representatives. Completed with Parliament’s budget control on the federal police budget!

Subsequently, the National Security Plan remained a tool for Parliament to control the government’s security policy. However, we must have found that the national security plan lacks the essential element for this control, namely the allocation of people and resources, in short of capacity, ahead of the priorities set by the government. This allocation of capacity is not reflected in this federal or national security plan, so we with this Parliament cannot control what resources the government uses to realize the security priorities. This means, in a very concrete way, that Parliament cannot exercise any control over the government’s security policy, which is exercised and carried out by the federal police. There is no fiscal control and no policy control. There remains only the supervision and control of the magistracy on this federal police. This is an important conclusion of the parliamentary investigation committee Dutroux.

What has been done now? The appointment of these magistrates has been entirely politized by allowing them to take place through a ministerial decision consulted in the Council of Ministers. This is a novelty in the history of our democracy, a historical precedent. For the first time, not only a royal decree, but also a ministerial decree could be consulted in the Council of Ministers. This has never happened in the history of Parliament and I call on the constitutional experts to witness.

And this novum, Mr. Speaker, takes place under your presidency.

The competence of the Council of Ministers extends more specifically to the designation of the magistrates who will exercise supervision over the federal police. Concretely, this means that this historical precedent, this novum, must serve as the legitimation of a political compromise within the government and the government parties, holding the appointment of the magistrates who will oversee the federal police. Their

Colleagues, this is not only an unimaginable precedent, it is the total denial of what chamber width was approved in the Octopus Agreement, in particular an objective approach to the appointment and appointment of magistrates. Furthermore, it is an absolute denial of the conclusions of the Dutroux Parliamentary Investigative Committee, which were approved by all and expressly stated that the federal police may act autonomously or autonomously, but, among other things, must be under the independent supervision of magistrates. Their

This independent supervision is now a dead letter by the political designation of these magistrates who, by the way, are the predecessors of the federal prosecutor’s office.

In the absence of a budgetary control, a security policy control and an independent supervision by the judiciary, the federal police begin a democratic vacuum on 1 January 2001. Per ⁇ you agree with me, colleagues, that this is shaking for every right-wing Democrat.

At the beginning of this week, I pulled the alarm bell. I asked the Chairman of the Chamber to convene the special committee, which is responsible for the guidance of the Committee-P. After all, this is our last stroke as an external control body on the federal police. Tomorrow the special committee will meet, and the only possibility remaining to us is to instruct the Committee-P to take that last stop in this democratic vacuum, in particular to organize a qualitatively strong control of this federal police.

Given the circumstances and the great risk that threatens us, the Minister of Justice should blow off the start of the federal police. Indeed, as a guardian of the rule of law, a Minister of Justice cannot take such a risk. Let me point to you, gentlemen of the government.

The conclusion is clear: at the start of the federal police, the condition is not only serious, but also hopeless.

Mr. Speaker, my colleagues, I had lost the Minister of Justice from the eye for a moment. Probably because he is completely encrypted with this design, colleague Coveliers.

My initial proposal, Mr. Minister, which was submitted with great concern for the rule of law aspect of this matter, has come heavily rejected from both assemblies. I no longer recognize it. Moreover – colleague Van Parys has pointed out – the spirit and letter of the Octopus Agreements are completely misunderstood.

I would like to remind you that when we drafted a new model for the police, we were not looking at a unity police – as when lapsus was stated in the policy note of the minister – but an integrated police on two levels. We paid special attention to the opposition. In a democracy there is no power without opposition. Police was, in our opinion, authority-dependent of the administrative government, of the two ministers and at the local level of the mayor. The police should be democratically controlled. At the local level, this must be done by the municipal or intercommunal police council. At the federal level, however, the commission for the police does not attend. This implies a democratic deficit. Finally, there is a third opponent. This is a judicial supervision of the general and special operation of the police. All this was the counterweight for the integrated police on two levels. Some people thought that there should be enough counter-power if there is only one police left.

As a result, there is no judicial supervision. The majority does not dispute that. Moreover, it also assumes that these duties are not judicial, that these members of the Prosecutor’s Office are appointed by the Government, that they carry out police duties there, that they are in no hierarchical connection with the Prosecutor’s Office and that they are in no hierarchical connection with the College of General Prosecutors. That is the position of the majority. This is not even consistent with the most modern fulfillment of the theory of three powers, which is no longer about the separation of powers, but is a doctrine of powers that balance each other.

These members of the Prosecutor’s Office will have police duties. They are not in a hierarchical relationship with the College of Attorneys-General. They are not only under the authority of the Minister, they are also under the direction and supervision of the Minister in respect of these tasks. This is ⁇ delicate, as they take care of, among other things, the collection of intelligence by the federal police. They are involved in what is called pro-active research. They will oversee – when it comes to it – decisions on spending funds on certain studies. All this is now put under the direct responsibility of the Minister of Justice. He assumes a ⁇ heavy responsibility.

He can hide behind nothing or anyone. He shall be politically accountable to this Chamber for these magistrates, who do not perform a magisterial function but an official function. These magistrates will not be officials of the Prosecutor’s Office, but officials of the Minister. This is a break with the doctrine of the Three Powers, and I have heard that even the Court is concerned about this fundamental break.

Mr. Bourgeois, you are not talking about the Court of Cassation or the Court of Arbitration, but about la baraque d'en face?

These are not beautiful words, Mr. Annemans.

Mr. Speaker, they once spoke about us here. Do not forget that.

Mr. Speaker, the Court is concerned, as I hear, about this shift in the doctrine of three powers.

In addition, it will be about purely political appointments. These members of the Public Prosecutor’s Office will no longer be appointed in these positions by the Minister of Justice and even by the Minister of Justice and the Minister of Home Affairs on the advice – and not on presentation, as we had desired – of the College of Attorneys-General, as the draft has left here in the Chamber. Even these conditions have not survived the amendment strike in the Senate. The College of Attorneys General will not even give advice anymore. Appointments shall be made by ministerial decision, consulted in the Council of Ministers. I do not need to draw that. The PS has expressed its will in the Senate. He has used all possible arguments. It had to be taken back to the figure of the national magistrates, my initial proposal. There had to be a procedure through the Supreme Council for Justice, which, of course, could no longer be due to time. In the end, they achieved their goal. If only there would be no advice from the College of Attorneys-General and if the appointment would only take place in the entire Council of Ministers. This means that the Minister of Justice, who is politically responsible, is no longer competent in the final decision on the appointment. He will have to do what the Council of Ministers decides on this.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Minister, Colleagues, all these elements urge me to vote against this draft that was my original bill and met a large deficit that threatened to arise. I warned about this already in January. The federal police began on January 1, 2001. Due to internal disagreement within the majority, the draft on the federal prosecutor's office was not ready. Finally, a bill has been submitted to the Federal Prosecutor’s Office by colleague Erdman and other members of the majority. There has been an opinion from the State Council that contains a lot of legal state concerns. There has been an opinion from the High Council for Justice, which also shows great concerns.

I submitted that bill because of this gap and requested and obtained the urgency. However, what now comes from the mill of the Chamber and Senate no longer resembles the original bill. I will therefore vote with great resentment against my original bill.

Mr. Speaker, the discussion we are conducting today will still have to be conducted many times, for example in the discussion of the federal prosecutor’s office and the vertical integration of the prosecutor’s office. I am pleased that we are able to conduct this fundamental discussion both in the committee and in the Parliament. What is good can happen twice; that happens here in the Room with less good things, after all, too. From this discussion, I remembered one surprising fact. In fact, I find that the President of the People’s Union—where has the fierce pride been threatened? - in this Chamber became the spokesman of the Belgian Court. In this context, he expressed the opinion of the Court. What this means in the context of the separation of powers is not very clear to me, but I note that.

What I understand – sometimes there are things that I understand – is that colleague Van Parys, of course, had hoped to realize this within the framework of the Octopus Accords. He now claims that others realize this.

Mr. Coveliers, you addressed Mr. Bourgeois.

Mr. Speaker, I cannot help the fact that I do not yet have an interruption button to point you out that I want to intervene. I know that Mr. Coveliers had already advanced a little further in his speech.

Interruption buttons are a dangerous game, Mr. Bourgeois. Now I can sometimes let my eye wander — Mrs. D'Hondt has experience with that — but with interruption buttons one must be careful.

Mr. Speaker, I know that you are ⁇ attentive, but sometimes you notice too late that a speaker wants to speak. I would have wanted to intervene when Mr. Coveliers, who apparently still carries complexes from a past life, claimed that I am the spokesman of the Royal Court. The wish is of course the father of the thought, but whoever has listened carefully knows that I have only communicated that the Court is apparently concerned about this bill, without wanting to come forward as a spokesman of the Court. I only said what I heard.

I do not understand at all what this argument has to do with the discussion and I do not understand why such a communication should be made. If you really want to be the spokesman of the Court, do so.

In essence, it is indeed a different view of the function of the public prosecutor, which is connected with a different view of the status of the investigative judge. In this context, we could refer to the recent corpus iuris in connection with the European Public Prosecutor’s Office proposed by a number of highly educated ladies and gentlemen. There is also no question of an investigative judge, but of a magistrate who must very clearly ensure the implementation of the criminal policy. This means that priorities are set, so that choices are made. You cannot ask judges to make choices and prioritize, because judges must be able to judge independently. This can be requested from employees of the executive power who need to set a number of priorities in order to conduct an efficient policy.

Well, the prosecutor’s office is in our country, as in most European countries, between two horses. On the one hand, there is his follow-up function. According to the opinion of the High Council for Justice, we will have to discuss this in the case of whether the Federal Prosecutor’s Office should also be able to exercise a prosecution function.

On the other hand, it performs a function of guiding the police. The French translation of “contrôle” means, in my opinion, rather that it exercises supervision. There is therefore a clear distinction. This consists in the fact that when one exercises control, one begins to check what someone else is doing and takes some distance from it in order to be able to exercise control. This is also what Parliament should do when it controls. When, on the other hand, one “sends,” one participates in the social function. When the Prosecutor’s Office joins the police – that is, not only the federal police, but also the local police – it also participates in the actions of the police and determines, together with the police chief, the priorities. It thus cooperates with the College of Mayors and Creatives and the Government and Parliament, which are responsible for the administrative management at the local and federal levels, respectively.

If, according to Montesquieu’s ancient static theory, one says that the public prosecution is part of the judiciary, then in order to direct the police’s prosecution policy, we will have to provide a different figure, which is also the case in some countries. I see that you disagree with this, Mr. Bourgeois. The view of the majority differs. Furthermore, the distinction is clearly reflected in the fact that the magistrates are appointed and not appointed to manage the police services for one year, pending the approval of the law on the federal prosecutor’s office and the Supreme Council for Justice to fulfill the mandates.

Mr. Coveliers, of course, is right that this provisional law is not about appointments, but that it will be discussed in the same discussion at the Federal Prosecutor’s Office. Therefore, it is about the fulfillment of their competence. I know that the Supreme Council will play a role in this. At the Federal Public Prosecutor’s Office, at least the same discussion will take place.

Second, Mr. Coveliers, you’ve always been talking about ‘directing’. I would like to hear you say that and there really is no French equivalent for it. I would like to point out that the management is carried out by the ministers, who exercise authority over it. They are the authorities. For carrying out checks there is the Inspection General, an external inspection commissioned by the ministers. The court has a legal — maybe to your regret, but so it is stated in the law on the police — a task of supervision that goes beyond control. I think of the discussion at the architect’s assignment about controlling or supervising. Surveillance goes even further than control. The court supervises the general and special operation of the police. This is to ensure that the police comply with the law. They should not send with them, because then they would not be able to control.

Mr. Speaker, in this high-minded discussion, I only want to warn Mr. Coveliers not to defend this project with too much passion. We are ultimately pushed through the throat. Another proposal that was pushed by the throat was that on the judicial cantons with the famous Giet Amendment. In the meantime, you know that the Flemish Parliament, on a proposal from VU and CVP, has invoked the conflict of interest. It was a surprising message for me that the speaker, who came after many suspensions to say that the conflict of interest should be invoked and that the whole majority agreed, was Mr. De Gucht.

With all that improvisational gungling and all kinds of political manipulation behind the scenes, I would like to warn Mr. Coveliers. I do this purely and solely out of collegiality. The cohesion is apparently not only a problem in the majority, but even in its own party. Do I now dream, or was the reality that in the Conference of Presidents and first also in the Committee on Justice, all kinds of pressures were exercised by Minister Verwilghen to push that bill on the cantons through our throat? Then, after a series of interruptions, the party chairman of Minister Verwilghen announces in the Flemish Parliament, on behalf of the majority, that they are invoking the conflict of interest! So, Mr. Coveliers, a little calm down with the defense, who knows what else will happen.

Mr. Speaker, especially typical and painful, Mr. Van Peel, it is you, whose qualities I have heard yesterday to boast, that this discussion is misappreciated.

That others do, up to that, but you have said that you would not do it. This discussion is not about defending anything that needs to be approved quickly. I even tried to discuss the difference between a static vision — which I think is obsolete but for which one can ⁇ argue — and a dynamic vision of the prosecutor’s office. The latter is my preference, but I can of course be mistaken, just like some people who have written a lot of books about it. The dynamic vision states that in the modern way of protecting society, the detective function must coincide with the follow-up function. The judiciary, of course, must oversee the police services so that they do not violate the law and as it should do to everyone. However, that is not the task of those magistrates who now have to form together the police services. This is not stated in any law, in the Octopus Agreements, or in any report of a parliamentary investigation committee. On the contrary, in its 1990 report, the first commission of inquiry made it very clear that the position of the public prosecutor should be revised. That is the issue here. So it is not the question of how much the minister will have any influence on that. The criminal policy will set priorities and that criminal policy should be applied by the police services.

Mr. Speaker, I have a great respect for Mr. Coveliers’ statement and there is, of course, a lot to say about the place of the prosecutor’s office within the whole of the state powers. However, this is not the subject of this. The question here is whether we will comply with the Octopus Act. In it we said that the appointment of magistrates must be done on the basis of objective grounds. What happens here? Even the government’s position, in which it said in this Parliament that it would be the interior and justice ministers, is not met. The PS has demanded that this be done by a ministerial decision consulted in the Council of Ministers. This clearly shows that this designation will be a compromise between the political parties of the majority and the government. That is the problem and that is what we are talking about. Will we follow the objectivation or will we enable the politization? This amendment does the exact opposite of what we had envisaged in the Octopus Act.

Mr Coveliers, can you finish?

Mr. Speaker, I have to answer here. You are often much coulanter for the opposition than for the majority. I would like to have the opportunity to answer a few elements because I find this ⁇ interesting.

Mr. Van Parys, if the magistrates, who are appointed by the government to monitor a police service more closely, were all politically appointed and incompetent, then you would be right. I note that, both in the past and now, among the national magistrates, the auxiliary magistrates designated by the ministers, were highly qualified and less qualified persons. So I think we shouldn’t talk about quality.

Second, I also do not believe that any government will designate inappropriate people, four members of the prosecutor’s office, who will have to perform a role of example for the Supreme Council of Justice for a period of not more than one year. They will be evaluated by an organ on which they have no vessel. From the last opinion, by the way, it shows that we also have no control over this and that is good too. I have full confidence in this government and in the Minister of Justice. The four top judges will face a difficult task. Why Why ? Because they themselves will not know how to fulfill their function, because we are even discussing it. I can’t assume that one would designate incompetent persons for this.

Mr. Speaker, I am going around. It is not the task of these magistrates to carry out the control. The control of the police services, separate from the judicial control in the case of violation of the Criminal Code, should be carried out in two ways. I refer to the Senate’s Report on Organized Crime, which describes this very thoroughly. One, internal control: that means that the corps commander can verify whether his corps works efficiently and executes efficiently decisions taken. At the federal level, the Ministers of Home Affairs and Justice must appeal to the inspection. Second, external control: in every democracy, of course, there is a need for control, a counter-force. The police have a monopoly on legal violence. The Standing Committee for the Supervision of Police Services is currently overseeing the police services on behalf of the Parliament. They must monitor the social function of the police services. Police services should defend the rights, freedoms and European rights, and Committee P should exercise control there, on behalf of the Parliament. Therefore, there is indeed control and guidance of the police services. I am very pleased that the bad proposal of Mr. Bourgeois has been reformed into a much better proposal, which we will be able to approve with very great conviction.

Mr. President, I can assist Mr. Van Parys and Mr. Bourgeois. The current reform is indeed very far from the original proposal of Mr. Bourgeois, which provided for the appointment of national magistrates. In the proposal urgently and loudly imposed by the Senate, the four chief magistrates must not only exercise control and supervision over the federal police in the coming year, but also direct — or command, as Mr. Coveliers has so plasticly expressed it. The four Supreme Magistrates will be political pioneers in the hands of the majority parties and must first and foremost render political accountability to these parties. In this way, the probability becomes ⁇ high that the federal prosecutor, who will be appointed next year and who will become the country’s main prosecutor, will be a party-political creature, along with his secondaries.

This may be especially useful for this majority who is too willing to impress a socialist vision on the new prosecutor’s office. Following his SP predecessor, Mr. Landuyt, this vision was, by the way, fiercely defended by Mr. Coveliers. This vision consists in reducing the parquet magistrates to officials, to political instruments of the government. Colleagues, I dare suspect that you will find not only the opposition in your way, but also the magistrates themselves who in the future will be increasingly opposing you. Ladies and gentlemen of the majority, you will owe that exclusively to yourself.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Minister, I intended to ask for the floor to justify my vote, but since you allow me to do so, I will rather intervene now.

The choice that has been made is really bad. We are in a temporary situation. There are national judges. The latter could perfectly assume this role. By opting for ad hoc magistrates, one enters into a logic of politicization of the function, at a time when every act made is problematic since everyone is afraid when a change occurs. by

The prudence would have wanted to be held to the national magistrates. By not doing so, one gives a very bad sign to the police forces, to the magistracy as well as to the Supreme Council of the magistracy, which will question the role assigned to it in society.

That is why we will vote against this proposal.

Mr. Speaker, Mr. Minister, dear colleagues, let us be a little modest, because we have indeed thought that this police reform would not take place on 1 January 2001. Indeed, we have wasted time in preparing a proposal for a federal prosecutor’s office, where in the law on the police the supervision was entrusted to members of the federal prosecutor’s office. It was on the occasion of the hearing in the Justice Committee concerning the federal prosecutor’s proposal that Attorney General Schins – honouring who is worthy of honour – raised the problem that one could not have a federal prosecutor’s office on 1 January 2001. The functions could not be filled as the law clearly states that they must be members of the federal prosecutor’s office.

I am grateful to the opposition – especially Mr. Bourgeois – for briefly playing the ball and submitting a bill based on Mr. Schins’s suggestion to entrust the office to the national magistrates. Fortunately, because this has awakened some people. For indeed, Mr. Tant, Minister Duquesne is ready to carry out that police reform on 1 January 2001.

I do not see any reason for you to formulate this. Over the past few months, I have done nothing but call on Minister Duquesne to urgency. Nevertheless, to this day, I must establish that the decisions he makes - in the absence of proper preparation in the form of royal decrees - no longer take place within the legality. That is the problem, too, Mr. Erdman. It should have been further, and then there would have been a logical outcome. You yourself acknowledge that the government has fundamentally failed here. Why do you blame others?

Mr. Speaker, colleagues, I may be one of the few privileged witnesses of a statement by the then Minister of Home Affairs who, faced with this problem during the Octopus discussions, begged not to realize this reform by 2001. So much reform had to be done. Minister Tobback made this very clear at the time, but it had to.

Therefore, it is true that the same political family bears responsibility.

This is indeed history. But we must now organize a check in the absence of a federal prosecutor’s office.

Indeed, in the absence of a prosecutor’s office, we must organize an inspection by other magistrates, since there is no federal prosecutor’s office. The proposal of colleague Bourgeois was a good attempt, but I think he must admit in all honesty that when we began to dissolve, we came to the conclusion that we had to look for another track. I think Mr. Bourgeois remembers my first reaction very well.

We first analyzed what those functions all contained. Second, we found that the corps of national magistrates is rather limited. Third, we stood with the impossibility of expansion, because otherwise we would end up in a sphere of appointment. However, the possibility of appointment was not open, taking into account that the High Council for Justice had to intervene. Then it became clear that we had to look for another way out.

That exit was provided by the Minister of Justice who said that certain magistrates would be designated. You will remember the government’s amendment, which stated that the Ministers of Justice and Home Affairs would take care of these appointments together. The opposition then reacted with rejection, believing that one had to let go of his power and that one had to resort to his own powers. Only one position, where the law already provided for a double indication, could be accepted. The other appointments had to remain in the hands of the Minister of Justice. Thus, the formula of a dual accompaniment of these indications has been rejected. It was then accepted, on the basis of the Minister’s amendment, that this would be on the advice of the College of Attorneys-General.

I would like to make a small margin note. I noticed that we made the choice, even when we created the mandate for the federal supervisory prosecutor’s office, to entrust it to members of the prosecutor’s office. This was the only option; we did not appoint any magistrates from the seat for this purpose. I do not want, like colleague Coveliers, to go back to Montesquieu’s historical analysis of the separation of powers. I only note that it had been opted to assign those duties to members of the Public Prosecutor’s Office from that point on and not to magistrates of the seat. This is fundamental; if one speaks about the separation of powers, then automatically follows this discussion. Together with taking the option mentioned above, we have seen a fundamental discussion arise about the role of the prosecutor’s office within the framework of the structure of the court. I am very vague and I am not going over to the analysis.

At that time too, Mr. Van Parys, which is correct, the proposal concerning the Federal Prosecutor’s Office was submitted. The problem, which you have repeatedly raised during the hearings, was already raised there, namely that these magistrates would not be under the college of prosecutors-general, but right-wing under the supervision of the Minister of Justice. You remember the discussion we held here at that time. I have told you that I was consistent and remained, and everything I have defended here is completely in line with the vision that we have always defended. In this regard, we have no deviation from a vision adopted here. Their

Second, it must also be said, because we are speaking here not academically but politically, when in the proposal of colleague Bourgeois the option was taken to suddenly place the magistrates of the prosecutor’s office under the college, it was very clear to me that that option was in conflict with what was included in the proposal for the future federal prosecutor’s office. Therefore, the discussion was initiated in advance. When the proposal was first discussed in the Chamber, I told you here, from this tribune, that I did not wish to put a mortgage on the future if now these magistrates were to be placed in a different position than what ultimately was my approach to the function of a federal prosecutor. Their

Third, the Senate has indeed omitted the words concerning the opinion of the College of Attorneys-General, but you have heard the Minister. I note and act that, as it is stated with so many words in the law text, namely that every magistrate will have to answer the conditions that must be demanded later from candidates for the Federal Prosecutor’s Office, he indeed asks for advice. The profile as such is there. If I have understood him properly, by the way, he receives too much advice, even from individual forces and powers who suddenly pretend to make certain recommendations. In any case, he asks for that advice and thus simultaneously takes note of it.

I come to my last comment. The originality of a ministerial decision, consulted in the Council of Ministers, is, to that extent, also a confirmation of its actual scope. It is a ministerial decision, not a nomination. You know what the consequences would be in a appointment. It could not be a royal decision.

Mr. Van Parys, am I mistaken when I say that certain circular letters of a minister are sometimes also discussed in the Council of Ministers? Am I mistaken when I say that within the scope of the competence and the policy options of a minister, the Council of Ministers is informed about the circulation letters, the manner of application and the manner of exercising the competence?

I am not very impressed. You know I love some sort of originality and that’s why I might find this a nice construction. In any case, it gives the guarantee that one also underlines the value, the scope of this designation in this interim period and puts the full political responsibility on the Council of Ministers. After all, you have – and I have listened carefully – repeatedly emphasized and continued to emphasize, both Mr. Parys and Mr. Bourgeois, that that minister will now be responsible only there and that that responsibility could then be attributed to him, and so on. Don’t apologize, you’ve scared him almost so much that he may have accepted in the Senate that it would be the responsibility of the Council of Ministers when someone should observe that position. Their

I come to the conclusion of my contribution. I reiterate, in all humility and taking into account the fact that we were late in the development of the Federal Prosecutor’s Office, taking into account and paying homage to the initiative that brought this ball to roll, that this formula for this interim period seems to provide all the necessary guarantees for the function that these magistrates will have to exercise within that assignment and only for that assignment. It will therefore be with conviction that we will have the text, as it comes from the Senate, approved by our group.

I would like to remind the House that normally, when a text comes from the Senate, there is no longer a general discussion in the plenary session. However, I felt that this time I could rightly deviate from Article 68 and that it was normal that I allowed a broad debate.

I also have the pleasure to point out that the services of the House, the Justice Commission, have managed to have a text printed, translated, distributed a little more than sixty minutes after the debate. I would like to emphasize this. When it is good, it should also be emphasized.