In an accelerated regime, the government then pushed through an amendment to the law in the House of Representatives, thereby denying the rights of the opposition. At the same time, it disappointed the expectations of seniors that their pensions would increase more than according to the last-minute changed rules. Therefore, representatives of the ANO movement appealed to the Constitutional Court.
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After careful deliberation, the majority of constitutional judges proved them wrong. In the end, it wasn’t a dramatic decision. 12 out of 15 judges decided to reject the complaint of the ANO movement. In the past, in some highly watched cases, we witnessed much closer scores. For example, in 2008, when the opposition tried to abolish regulatory fees in the healthcare sector, only eight judges were against and seven of them agreed with such a proposal.
On the contrary, the arguments for rejecting the complaint regarding the extraordinary valorization of pensions completely prevailed. It follows from them that Fial’s cabinet did not abuse the opportunity to discuss the relevant amendment in a state of legislative emergency. In the opinion of the court, he had good reasons for this.
The uproar around pensions will not die down
Although some deadlines are significantly shortened in such a regime and the debate may be limited, the new form of extraordinary pension valorization was discussed in the House of Representatives for dozens of hours. Opposition obstruction contributed to this. MPs from the ANO and SPD movements made no secret of their use.
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It is not surprising that they failed at the Constitutional Court with the argument that they could not adequately comment on this law. If they want to use similar justifications in the future, they should forgive the obstructionists if possible or at least hide them better.
It can be expected that the verdict will be subjected to all kinds of criticism in the coming days. It will hardly be able to rely on the small possibility of the opposition to comment on the norm. Rather, it will be focused on the unfulfilled expectations of pensioners.
There, the court came to the somewhat unusual conclusion that some expectations may have been raised, but only for a short time. At the same time, it was argued that the real expectation occurs at the moment when the pension should be paid. If this did not happen within the deadline and it was subsequently reduced, then, according to the court, this could be a valid argument.
Since the verdict of the Constitutional Court is final and cannot be appealed, it cannot be changed. Not even when the opposition presented a series of strong evidence that the judges were wrong. This cannot be expected to actually occur. The court carefully discussed the whole case and similarly proceeded to justify its decision, although three judges disagreed with it in some parts.
Nevertheless, the uproar around pensions and their increase will not die down. On the one hand, there is another complaint regarding this issue before the Constitutional Court. On the one hand, it is a topic that can secure the support of a large part of the electorate. So the fight for the form of pensions will continue. After the elections, it may result in further changes regarding the pension system, including the much-discussed valuations today.
The author is a commentator on Czech Radio
