6 March, 2018
The Council for the Judiciary conceptually supported the amendments to the Judicial Disciplinary Liability Law on the Judicial Disciplinary Committee’s right to impose an extraordinary assessment of judge's professional activities examined at the Saeima's first reading, but several proposals were corrected according to their original idea as expressed by the Council for the Judiciary.
The Council for the Judiciary deems it necessary to implement wider application of the extraordinary assessment of judges' professional activities, not bounding it merely to imposition of disciplinary sanction and without considering it as an additional penalty. The Council of the Judiciary indicates that such an assessment is also possible in cases where, for example, the imposition of a penalty in disciplinary proceedings have become time-barred, disciplinary proceedings are terminated or the case is examined without imposing disciplinary penalty.
The Council for the Judiciary considers that the decision on determining the extraordinary assessment of a judge's professional activity cannot be appealed.
The Council for the Judiciary supported also other amendments to the Judicial Disciplinary Liability Law, including the changes in the composition of the Judicial Disciplinary Committee, with the waiver of the provision that only the chairs of the courts are elected in the Disciplinary Committee, and setting the representation from all courts as the main criterion.
The Council for the Judiciary also considered and supported the amendments to the Law "On Judicial Power" related to the proposed extraordinary assessment of judges' professional activities.
However, the Council for the Judiciary did not support a number of other parliamentary proposals for amendments to the law "On Judicial Power", such as the creation of special family courts in Latvia, the increase in the age of the candidate for judicial position, determination of a term of office for a judge and the inclusion of parliamentarians in the composition of the Judicial Qualification Committee.
The Council for the Judiciary adopted the decision in the sitting of 5 March 2018.
Information prepared by
Rasma Zvejniece, the Head of the Division of Communication of the Supreme Court
E-mail: rasma.zvejniece@at.gov.lv, telephone: +371 67020396, +371 28652211