Senators turned to the Constitutional Court after the government added a new resolution to the previous restrictions, according to which there can be a maximum of one person per fifteen square meters in shops, but at the same time most shops remained completely closed.
Retail has been banned since October, but there are exceptions. Grocery stores, flower shops, drugstores or, for example, pet supplies, as well as weapons and ammunition stores, can be open – albeit with limited opening hours. But now, according to 63 senators, there is no reason for a general closure.
“Small establishments can easily regulate the number of people in the store and ensure that the distances in front of the store are observed. This would lead to a greater dispersion of shoppers, and they would not concentrate in front of hypermarkets, which could remain open and also sell an assortment of closed stores, “said Senator Lukáš Wagenknecht (Pirates), who initiated the submission.
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Deputy Prime Minister Karel Havlíček (for YES) last week justified the closure of most stores by saying that the government is trying to prevent people from traveling to them. “If we let a hundred thousand small shops work, we will increase mobility by millions of people, which is not a problem for small shops. It’s a problem that people there take a bus, a tram, meet at stops, “he explained.
According to a group of senators who turned to the Constitutional Court, the regulation actually discriminates against small business owners. According to her, the exceptions mainly benefit large retail chains operating supermarkets or hypermarkets, which may be open.
“For example, in other countries – France, Belgium – if there are some limits on the sale of basic necessities, then large hypermarkets cannot sell other things,” Wagenknecht added in Monday’s Events.
Wagenknecht: A self-employed person does not have the opportunity to defend himself in court
The submission to the Constitutional Court lists, among other things, four articles of the Charter of Fundamental Rights and Freedoms (3, 4, 11 and 26), which, according to the senators, were violated by a government resolution.
“We have constitutional requirements here that must be respected, and it is not possible for a government in a state of crisis to abuse its position,” Wagenknecht said in Monday’s 1990s. According to him, the problem, for example, is that there are not enough options to get the case to court.
“In a crisis law, as it is written, according to the interpretation of the Constitutional Court, only senators or deputies can stand at the moment to investigate it,” he explained. “A normal self-employed person, who today is purposefully liquidated by the government, has no right to defend himself in court in any way,” he added.
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Constitutional Lawyer: It is more a question of justification
According to the constitutional lawyer Jan Kudrna, the closure of most small shops is unequal at first sight. “From the point of view of law and whether the government acted in a purposeful or discriminatory manner, for example, it would be decisive why some shops are open and others are not,” he said in the 1990s.
“This means that it is more a question of justification, whether a different approach is rationally sustainable, or whether it is purposeful or possibly unjustifiable, and so on,” Kudrna added, adding that he was unable to assess it. “Because I have personally seen a complete deficit on the part of the government for a very long time in the ability to at least explain the basic principles of why some stores open and others do not,” he added.
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Most trades remain closed even after the epidemic risk has been reduced from the highest fifth to the fourth degree. The general opening will come with the third degree, which, according to the estimate of the Minister of Health Jan Blatný (for YES), can be expected at best at the turn of November and December.
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