Failure to provide honorary judges with stable employment

Question for written answer  E-000893/2021
to the Commission
Rule 138
Simona Baldassarre (ID), Rosanna Conte (ID), Annalisa Tardino (ID), Alessandra Basso (ID)

In Italy, for many years now, honorary judges, for whom provision is made in both civil and criminal law, have been pursuing a court battle to obtain recognition of their status as a ‘national judicial body’ (see Article 267 TFEU) and to secure the application of Directive 2003/88 concerning paid, fixed-term employment, asking to be placed on the same footing as ordinary judges with regard to pay and welfare benefits.

Even though the European Court of Justice recognised those prerogatives in its judgment (C-658/18) of 16 July 2020, no legislative action has been taken to eliminate these differences in treatment, despite numerous protests by those directly concerned.

In view of this, can the Commission answer the following questions:

• 1.How does it intend to protect the rights of honorary judges in accordance with the decision of the EU Court of Justice of 16 July 2020?
• 2.Should it not reiterate what it already stated in its recommendations of 20 May 2020 (point 4) with regard to improving the efficiency of the judicial system?
• 3.Could it not foster and facilitate the dissemination and sharing of good practices as regards paid and fixed-term employment relationships among the Member States?

Supporter[1]

• [1] This question is supported by a Member other than the authors: Mara Bizzotto (ID)