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The secret history of the 2018 elections in 84 color pages.
I’ll buy it
At 5.30 pm on Wednesday afternoon, the ambassadors of the EU member states met in Brussels to find out what the German government had agreed with Hungarians and Poles on what the agreement would be under which Viktor Orbán and Mateusz Morawiecki they were willing to withdraw from the budget veto.
The draft agreement also reached 444.
According to the text, Hungary and Poland basically got what they wanted. And the European Parliament has lost almost everything it broke in a bill called the Rule of Law Mechanism in early November.Whether the current version is final will only be known after the Thursday-Friday summit in Brussels, where it must be agreed by the leaders of the member states. Viktor Orbán will travel to Brussels on Wednesday night for preparatory talks. The reservations of the Dutch, Danish, Swedish and Finnish heads of government could be the main drivers of the deal. At first glance, the moderate factions in the European Parliament are swallowing the frog and trying to communicate the agreement as a success, as did, for example, MEP Anna Donáth.
The success of the Hungarian and Polish governments in this debate is in fact nuanced, as they have complained about many aspects that were not even included in the mechanism or that could only be read very indirectly, and now they receive guarantees that are almost unnecessary. promise, because otherwise they did not threaten the governments of Warsaw and Budapest either. However, in general, Orbán and Morawiecki received discounts in important cases.
Key points of the draft agreement
It will be a rule of law mechanism, in the version once adopted by the EP and Council Presidencies in early November, which was completely unacceptable to the Polish and Hungarian governments. However, additional guidelines are being developed for the usability of the mechanism, which significantly limit the application of sanctions.
Hungary and Poland are guaranteed not to use the mechanism until the EU court decides whether the law is in line with EU law. Such a decision could take years, that is, it will not be possible to apply before the Hungarian elections of 2022 and perhaps the Polish elections of 2023. This was a very important request from the Orban, although it was never discussed in public.
The European Commission will prepare a manual on how to use the mechanism, taking into account current negotiating considerations (see below), and it will be discussed with Member States, including Hungary and Poland.
The Council will issue a statement at the next summit, underlining that the mechanism can only be used to protect the spending of EU money. This is a point that the European Parliament has expanded a bit. The principle was maintained, but examples were included in the text (such as the independence of the judiciary) that the protection of EU money could have been interpreted more broadly, arguing that where there is no rule of law, there is no money of the EU in good hands. Under the current agreement, the mechanism can only be dealt with in the mechanism, for example, if it is masked by specific embezzlement, specifically in the case of EU money.
Under the agreement, only areas specifically regulated by EU law can be subject to a review of the rule of law, respecting the constitutional provisions of the Member States themselves. In fact! When there is another way for the EU to enforce its laws, such as an infringement procedure, the mechanism cannot be applied.
In essence, the mechanism will only be used for cases of fraud, corruption and conflicts of interest involving EU money. Not when a general violation of the rule of law is perceived, it is categorically included in the text. The procedure must show that the financial interests of the EU have been harmed.
The mechanism cannot be applied to payments before 2021, that is, it cannot affect funds already committed and payments made so far, only to programs launched in the future.
When the Commission investigates, it must take responsibility for all its findings, that is, it cannot rely on the reports or investigations of other organizations. You can start with them, but you should also check the conclusions in their own right. The Hungarian and Polish governments have rejected the Commission’s national reports on the rule of law released this fall, citing, among other things, the fact that they often referred to documents from “serialist” institutions.
This is a super fuse
The mechanism would have looked a lot like that anyway, based on the prime ministers’ summer deal. But in autumn, the European Parliament blackmailed the inclusion of clauses that could have given a broader interpretation of the rule of law in a possible procedure.
The governments of Poland and Hungary considered this to be a very serious threat. Their concerns were not necessarily entirely justified, but they felt that it was dangerous for the EU to penalize governments that were demolishing democracy. At present, only the suspension of voting rights in such a case can be a sanction (at the end of the seven-week procedure), and this remains the case under the current agreement. This, in turn, is such a severe penalty and so difficult to impose that even Orban and Morawiecki are not afraid of it.
However, it is also true that the existence of the mechanism, and its applicability within a few years, could be a new tool against apparently corrupt Member States. It is doubtful, of course, how they will be able to prove fraud from Brussels, especially in countries (like Hungary) that have not joined the EPPO.
If this deal passes through the Council, the governments of Hungary and Poland will not have to fear fines for the rule of law for the next two to three years, and then they will have to commit essentially proven crimes to face such sanctions.
Another question, in turn, is the political cost of the two countries threatening to veto the budget for weeks. Many in Brussels see that their isolation from others may increase and find themselves at a disadvantage in other issues and areas.
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