H.E. Dr. Tamás Magyarics:

I thank the committee for inviting me to come before it and I welcome this opportunity to speak about the rule of law in Hungary. The Hungarian parliament accepted, with a two-thirds majority, a new fundamental law in 2011, which came into force on 1 January 2012. The fundamental law replaced the previous constitution, which was first drafted in 1949 and amended several times, in particular during and after 1989. Hungary was the last country among the central and eastern European states to introduce a new constitution after the transition and profound political changes in 1989 and 1990. Redrafting the constitution was long overdue. During the political transition in Hungary in 1989 and 1990 it was suggested that a constitutional convention be called into session, but ultimately this was shelved.

In the next two decades, or so, several different propositions and proposals were made to write a new constitution and they required a two-thirds majority in the parliament. Given the very polarised nature of Hungarian political life, no political party was able to introduce a new constitution or a draft for a new constitution until 2010, when the current coalition Government received a two-thirds majority and was in a position to fulfil what had been on the agenda of all political forces in Hungary.

The fundamental law and its amendments, especially the fourth amendment of 11 March 2014, aroused widespread interest and debate both inside and outside Hungary. The documents were extensively scrutinised by, among others, the European Commission, members of the European Parliament, the Council of Europe, the Venice Commission, the US Department of State in its annual human rights reports, a number of civil organisations and the domestic and international media, with various degrees of expertise and knowledge of the actual texts. The Hungarian Government continued an extremely intense and extensive dialogue with official and unofficial partners and, when it considered objections valid, it changed or modified laws and regulations. As a result it may well be that the fundamental law of Hungary is the most widely scrutinised and approved such document in the European Union. The drafting of the constitution took around eight months during 2010 and 2011 and, ultimately, it was accepted by a two-thirds majority of members of parliament. It is sometimes noted that no other political forces took part in the process but they voluntarily withdrew from the debate and did not wish to take part in the political process for reasons of their own.

The Venice Commission stated that the new constitution "establishes a constitutional order based on democracy, the rule of law and the protection of fundamental rights as underlying principles". The Venice Commission approved the constitution and did not find it wanting in terms of basic principles, including the rule of law. The majority of comments on rule of law in Hungary have centred on electoral law, media regulation, the status of churches and religious organisations and the independence and structure of the judiciary.

I will now address electoral law. The electoral districts, set by an executive order in 1990, did not change for 20 years despite substantial population shifts during this period. Thus, the largest electoral district incorporated two and a half times as many voters as the smallest one in 2010. The new electoral law halved the number of members of parliament and the total is currently 199. Some 106 members of parliament are elected directly in a first past the post system while the rest can get a mandate on party tickets and through a so-called compensation ticket. The threshold for parties for sending candidates into parliament is 5% of the popular vote. The 2014 parliamentary elections were declared fair and open - the observers, including those of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, OSCE, in some cases missed a larger turnout of minorities, especially the Roma population. Hungarian electoral law is sometimes criticised for distorting the popular vote in favour of the biggest party but if the Hungarian elections of 2010 and 2014 had been run entirely on a first past the post basis the current coalition would have received between 90% and 95% of seats in parliament. It cannot be said that the current two-thirds majority system distorts the opinion of the population.

The passing of the new media law in 2010 provoked a heated debate. However, it should be remembered that the media had criticised the media law of 1995 because it put supervision into the hands of politicians delegated by the parliamentary parties. The new law broke with the possibility of the direct political influence and entrusted the oversight of the media to a media council, whose members are elected by a two-thirds majority of members of parliament. Commissioner Neelie Kroes expressed concerns about the concentration of power, which was unique across Europe, and the independence of the media council. As a result of constructive dialogue, the Commissioner, Ms Neelie Kroes, welcomed changes in media legislation on 26 November 2012. Media law has been modified three times since 2010, each time in co-operation with the European Commission or the Secretary General of the Council of Europe. The changes affected the registration of the press and media services and strengthened the protection of information sources and the independence of the media council. The most recent issue in this area relates to a new advertising tax. It arises as a consequence of disproportionate revenues from advertisements and the new tax does not affect all the media outlets equally. Advertising in the media generates €560 million per annum and tax of €4.1 million is paid - this is less than 1% of the revenue generated. The Hungarian Government wants to remedy this issue and spread the financial burden by taxing media outlets.

There are hundreds of organisations in Hungary that define themselves as religious organisations. As such, they enjoyed a number of benefits such as tax exemption for the organisation in question, a personal income tax exempt status for officials and so on. After 2010 the Hungarian Government wished to regulate the field and greatly reduced the number of churches and religious organisations that could still qualify for privileged status. It was decided they should meet certain criteria and, after modifications of the original law, partly in accordance with a ruling of the Hungarian constitutional court, the new criteria were set out. A church or religious organisation must have been in operation for at least 100 years internationally or 20 years in Hungary, in which case it must have a membership of at least 0.1% of the total population, or approximately 10,000 people. In addition, parliament must be given more precise criteria relating to an official church's suitability in promoting community goals, such as education, medical treatment, social services, charities and so on. Regardless of whether a religious group is recognised by parliament as a church, every religious group is entitled to use the word church in its official name. Officials from both recognised and unrecognised churches have the same rights and legal protections and their doctrines, internal regulations and statutes cannot be subject to state review, modification or enforcement.

The regulation of the authority and structure of the various members of the judiciary has also been amended - in compliance, for instance, with the observations of the Venice Commission of the Council of Europe. Criticisms had centred on the extensive authority of the president of the national judiciary office, which included budgetary and financial management of the courts, staffing, appointments, distribution of caseloads and the ability to transfer cases from one court to another. The fourth amendment to the constitution incorporated the provisions related to the judiciary into the fundamental law. The passing of the fifth amendment addressed the removal of the most controversial right of the president of the national judiciary office, that is, the right to transfer cases from one court to another. On the recommendation of the Secretary General of the Council of Europe, the president of the National Media and Infocommucations Authority is now to be appointed by the president and not the prime minister, as was originally provided for, while the president and members of the media council cannot be reappointed after the expiration of their nine-year terms, in contrast with the original stipulations.

Another widely discussed point was the mandatory retirement age for judges and state prosecutors. Originally, it would have required the introduction of mandatory retirement at the age 60 but ultimately a compromise was hammered out and the new system is to be introduced over a ten-year period, setting the retirement age at 65, that being the oldest age for retirement with pension benefits according to the relevant Hungarian Act on retirement and pensions. The change will become effective on 1 January 2023.

Finally, the Hungarian Government also dropped an amendment that would have allowed it to cover the cost of any future European Court of Justice fines by levying new taxes. I wish to conclude the opening statement with a general conclusion. As might be evident from the statement, and possibly if members have followed the Hungarian constitutional developments, the constitution has been shaped in the past four years in close co-operation with the relevant authorities within the European Union and therefore I would characterise the debate or dispute within the European Union over the Hungarian constitution and the amendments as a family dispute in which each member simply expresses his or her views and they try to hammer out a compromise for the benefit of the two parties.