Document CCR motivation regarding the submission of wealth statements. Ensuring the confidentiality of some data, considered insufficient

The Constitutional Court published, on Wednesday, the motivation of the decision declaring unconstitutional the publication of wealth statements on the ANI website, as well as the declaration of the revenues of the spouses. Among the arguments invoked by the RCC are the fact that a decision of the Court has not been correctly implemented and the fact that anonymization of information from the current statements does not ensure sufficient confidentiality.

First, the Court's magistrates invoked an older decision of the RCC, 415/2010, which ordered that the ANI law had unconstitutional provisions, including the one related to the publication of wealth statements

“As a result of this decision, the Parliament adopted the Law no.176/2010, by which it agreed with the provisions of the Constitution only the provisions of Law no. 144/2007, which led to the assimilation of the National Integrity Agency with a criminal and judicial research body, contrary to the constitutional principles regarding the execution of the justice by the courts. of wealth, the corrective brought consisting only in the anonymization of the address of the declared buildings -except for the locality where they are located -, of the address of the institution that manages the financial assets, of the personal numeric code, as well as of the signature ”, it is said in the reasoning of the decision.

The RCC argues that the anonymization of these data is not sufficient protection for the private life of the person, as guaranteed by the Constitution.

“It cannot be denied that, not infrequently, the knowledge of the locality in which the buildings are located easily allows the identification of the buildings owned by the declarant and the family members, although their exact address is anonymized, according to the criticized text. It is, for example, the case of persons living in small localities as a dimensions, in which the local is not dimensions. Not only the name of the street and the number of the building on the respective street are personal data that cannot be publicly disclosed by reference to the personal heritage of the declarant, but also the locality in which the building is located is such a date by reference to his person (…) the address of the building that the declarant holds, whether it is rendered in the local form, or the local, the locality), constitutes a personal information regarding the content of the heritage ”, notes the magistrates of constitutional litigation.

Also, judges invoke the fact that the declaration of assets does not constitute a standard practice at the European Union level.

“Of the 27 Member States of the European Union, only 10, apart from Romania, require members of the national parliaments to declare their wealth (Belgium, Bulgaria, Greece, Italy, Cyprus, Lithuania, Poland, Portugal and Slovenia), and of 3, in 3 states the statements of wealth are not to be informed by the public, being not known by the organisms, With their analysis (Belgium, France, Slovenia), in others the publication being only partial (Cyprus and Portugal).

On May 29, the Constitutional Court decided that statements of wealth and interests should not include the goods and revenues of the spouses. Also, the constitutional judges declared unconstitutional the article of law which provides for the obligation to publish the statements on the website of the National Integrity Agency.

Also, Law no. 115/1996 is mentioned for the declaration and control of the wealth of the dignitaries that provide for the mechanisms by which a control over the intergrity can be exercised in the exercise of public functions. The court judges claim that the salaries for the functions of the state apparatus are also public, so you can know what the revenues of those who hold these functions.

News in the course of update.