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It is with great pleasure that I stand before you today to introduce perhaps the most important bill in the history of the Legal Service and it is the one concerning its autonomy.
As you know, the effort and the goal in this direction has been underway for a long time. The first to envision the independence of the Legal Service was the late Michael Triandafyllidis, and subsequent Attorneys General have from time to time brought the issue to the forefront, most recently my predecessor Mr. Costas Clerides, who, following the relevant report of the Irish Experts on the Legal Service, drafted a relevant bill, which, however, was ultimately not advanced, during his time, in the House of Representatives, because it had not received the approval of the then Council of Ministers to be forwarded to the House of Representatives.
In assuming our high office from the outset, both the Assistant Attorney General of the Republic and I gave absolute priority to the issue of the autonomy of the Legal Service, in the context of the general reform of our Service, which I believe will constitute, if achieved, a milestone in the history of the Legal Service and a major contribution to the more effective administration of justice and the further consolidation of the Rule of Law in our country.
The reasons on which the implementation of the total autonomy of the Legal Service is based derive from the Constitution of the Republic itself, and in particular from the provisions of Article 112 thereof, which expressly provides, inter alia, that: "The Legal Service is an independent service not subordinate to any ministry."
In addition, the existing regime is also inconsistent with the structure of the Constitution, which provides for the members of the Legal Service in Part VI (on Independent Officers), which is distinct from Part VII (on Public Service) of the Constitution.
Notwithstanding the above constitutional provision of Article 112 of the Constitution on independent Legal Service and notwithstanding the fact that the Attorney General and the Assistant Attorney General who are members of the Legal Service serve on the same terms as the Judges of the Supreme Court, however, the legal officers of the Legal Service who represent and act on behalf of the Attorney General currently serve on the same terms as civil servants and are subject to the Civil Service Commission, which, inter alia, deals with matters of appointment, promotion and disciplinary authority over them.
The present bill provides for the autonomy and independence of the Legal Service and the legislative enshrinement of the salary alignment and equivalence of its senior legal officers with the District Court Judges, which has already been accepted and has already been enacted by the House of Representatives through the unanimous passage of the 2020 Budget Act. This is to strengthen the guarantee of the real impartiality of these officials vis-à-vis the Administration.
I want to stress that the increase in the salaries of the senior officials of the Legal Service was a package together with the rest of the Reform, which included the self-determination. It was implemented in the first party, with a provision in the Budget, now it remains to be incorporated in the "Law on the Legal Service of the Republic Act of 2023".
I would also like to note that the Bill, in addition to the tremendous efforts that were made within the Legal Service and the consultations that took place with the Ministry of Finance-and I thank the Director General of the Ministry for all the help in the process of discussing it-and the tremendous efforts that were made to convince the Government to move it forward-and it was one of the last projects of the previous Cabinet. And it has been tabled-I want to stress-it has been tabled by the present Government, so I think there is the involvement of both the past and the present Government in an issue that I think should go forward as a matter of course.
In addition to these consultations, the Bill was also assessed by a prominent constitutional expert outside the Legal Service, who expressed the view that the Bill is entirely consistent with the Constitution.
Furthermore, in the context of the autonomy of the Legal Service, the present Bill also regulates issues relating to the structure, organization and operation of the Legal Service, both with regard to legal officers and other officers staffing the Legal Service, thus strengthening its functional independence and further serving the public interest. The bill establishes a Prosecutorial Council, composed of the Attorney General and the Assistant Attorney General and the three most senior prosecutors in the hierarchy of the Republic. Among other things, the Prosecutorial Council will be responsible for the appointment and promotion of legal officers and for exercising disciplinary control over all staff of the Legal Service. As regards the non-legal staff of the Legal Service, a Staff Committee shall be established which shall be responsible, inter alia, for the appointment and promotion of the non-legal staff of the Legal Service. At the same time, the post of Director General of the Legal Service is established, who will, inter alia, exercise the functions of a controller within the meaning of the Fiscal Responsibility and Fiscal Framework Act. And this corrects another anomaly, that as the Legal Service currently stands, the person responsible for fiscal responsibility is the Attorney General himself. Which I think it is unthinkable that the Attorney General should have the responsibility of keeping track of the finances and the various circulars that are issued knowing the responsibilities and obligations that he has to carry out his work.
It should also be pointed out that this long-lasting effort of the Legal Service for its autonomy has now acquired an international dimension, much more urgent and much more urgent, which goes beyond the national framework and makes Cyprus accountable to international organisations and committees, such as the GRECO Commission of the Council of Europe and the European Commission on the Rule of Law.
And I will start by referring to the latest European Commission Report, issued on 13 July 2022, entitled: "2022 Rule of Law Report - a chapter on the state of the rule of law in Cyprus", where along with recalling the commitments made under the National Recovery and Resilience Plan regarding the fight against corruption, it clearly recommends and explicitly states the need - and I read from the Report - "to continue to improve the effective investigation and prosecution of high-level corruption cases, including by strengthening the Office of the Attorney General and its financial independence." And I stress the phrase "continue to improve" because the EU has recognised that over the past year there has been a major effort, and successful effort, to investigate and prosecute high-level corruption cases, which I demonstrated with figures to EU Commissioner Didier Reynders at our recent meeting, presenting him with the results of how many corruption cases were brought to the Court, which were more than double the number of cases brought last year. Therefore, the position of the Report was to continue to improve the effective investigation and prosecution of high-level corruption cases, including by strengthening the Office of the Prosecutor General and its financial independence. The Report is clear on this, and you know that the Rule of Law Reports have their own particular importance, especially in recent years where they have been linked to EU benefits to States.
At the same time, in the addendum to the GRECO Commission's second compliance report for the Fourth Evaluation Round of Cyprus, dated 8 July 2022, referring to the Bill on the autonomy of the Legal Service, the Commission notes that the Bill was not taken forward further and urges the competent authorities to accelerate the process of advancing the Bill with a view to further strengthening the autonomy of the Legal Service in the context of criminal prosecutions.
To conclude, in order to satisfactorily implement the last Recommendation pending for the Prosecuting Authorities in this Report, which remains pending, we have informed the Committee about the developments, namely that the Bill has been approved by the Council of Ministers and is before the Parliament. The Committee indicated that this is a positive step, but the chapter cannot be closed before the Bill is passed by the House of Representatives. It further noted that the only substantive measure achieved so far in this direction is the equalisation of salaries between judges and legal officers, but this alone is not enough to close this chapter. In other words, we come back to the point I made earlier that wage equalisation and autonomy are interlinked. The first has been done, the second has not and GRECO notes that it is not enough to increase salaries but the law must be passed.
In full relevance to all of the above, the European Commissioner for Justice, Mr. Didier Reynders after the meeting held on 4 May 2023, at the Legal Service, in the framework of the meetings he held in Cyprus recently, among other things, stated the following:
"Our effort is as we continue to work on strengthening the Office of the Attorney General of the Republic, because we want to see more financial resources, human resources as well as digital tools at the disposal of the Office of the Attorney General of the Republic to fight corruption in the country. These are included, as you know, in all our recommendations. It is very important to show that there is substantial investment in such an independent institution, so that the various investigations that are needed can be carried out with more resources available. We have seen real readiness [ON THE PART OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL'S OFFICE] for further steps and we will continue to discuss this issue in the future."
In English, verbatim:
"We try to continue to work for reinforcement of the Attorney-General's Office, because you know that in all recommendations we want to see more budgetary resources, human resource, but also digital tools for the Attorney-General's Office to fight against corruption in the country. It is very important to show that is a real investment in such an independent body for different investigations as needed to organize with more resources. And we have seen a real willingness to move to more. We saw this, but we will continue to discuss that in the next months and years."
Honourable Members of Parliament,
Honourable Ladies Councillors,
in light of the above, the necessity of passing the present bill, which is an innovation in the whole structure of justice in our country and constitutes an important step in the reform of the Legal Service, with the ultimate aim of better serving the public interest and more effective administration of justice, is evident.
In conclusion, I would like to recall that on all three occasions that I have had the honour of appearing before the House Finance Committee on the Legal Service Budgets, I have placed high on our priorities - in addition to the many other reforms we have already undertaken - the issue of autonomy. And I must recall that I received explicit assurances from all parties that if and when the autonomy bill is presented before the House - it will receive their support. These assurances I now ask you to implement.
(ML)
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