Southern European Parliaments in Democracy by Cristina Leston-Bandeira

Author:Cristina Leston-Bandeira [Leston-Bandeira, Cristina]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: Political Science, Political Ideologies, Democracy
ISBN: 9780415358880
Google: Vf82vMqCfogC
Goodreads: 1269882
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2005-01-15T13:57:47+00:00

The Status of Members of Parliament

The conflict that appears between the two constitutional principles of free representative mandate and party discipline constitutes a major problem. The operational criterion of the Greek political system is probably party discipline that is set by the political leaders; strict party discipline is always justified by the appeal to unity and the effective functioning of the party. The deficit in intra-party democracy is carried to the parliamentary field and becomes visible when the chairs of the parliamentary groups publicly declare without hesitation when they will ‘allow’ the MPs to exercise their ‘free vote’. The only outlet for overcoming the juxtaposition between the party and the parliamentary fields is an ad hoc balancing of two constitutional principles, within the framework of the ‘theory of harmony in practice’.53 It would be difficult for a revision of the constitution to overcome this inherent constitutional ‘contradiction’. The balancing referred to above is part of the general functioning of the political system, primarily of the Greek political culture that cannot be solved vaguely at the level of constitutional provisions. In any case, the new legislative and control competencies of the permanent parliamentary committees reinforce the individual presence of the MPs, as committee work is less party-dominated.

A major issue concerning the position of MPs is citizen perception of their trust worthiness. General scorn is expressed about political and parliamentary discourse as seen in many different surveys of public opinion in Greece. Specific amendments and their applications contribute to this situation. It was not by chance that the debate of the position and the rights of MPs during the revision of the constitution was connected with the closed shop manner in which they execute their role,54 in connection with the more general perception of corruption. On this point, three issues were identified: parliamentary immunity, parliamentary salary and the funds of MPs during electoral periods.

The issue of immunity was brought up by all the parties and a revision of the respective provision was proposed by the opposition, which in the end was not passed (article 62 C). The amendment on the immunity of MPs is a classic example of a volitionally mistaken application of a reasonable constitutional provision. There were strong reactions from the press, public opinion and MPs themselves against the usual rejection of all the proposals on the revoking of immunity: from 1974 to September 1996, about 700 applications were made to revoke immunity and only three were accepted.55 This has happened even in cases of behaviour obviously not becoming to the status of MP.56 The parliamentary minority proposed the reversal of the requirements for the revoking of immunity, whereupon immunity would be granted only when there were political causes. Parliament proposed that the provision remain as it was, the basic argument being in the difficulty in defining the exact meaning of political causes.

The issue of MPs’ salaries (article 63 C) was the subject of debate in connection with the proposal of the majority for the addition of a phrase (considered pompous by many) to demonstrate ‘honour and respect’ for the MPs.

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