The Parable of Parliamentary Immunity Stemming from the Experience of the Petitions Committee of the Senate

Abstract

Parliamentary inmunity has evolved, from a boom to a stabilization and fall phase. The number of requests to prosecute, has dropped dramatically and almost all are granted. This is the result of immunity judge-made law; by the Constitutional Court, in the first place, because his doctrine has made the prerogative limited, requiring that denials can be justified in view of the purposes for which the Constitution established it, and reserved the power to annul them otherwise. But the doctrine of the criminal section of the Supreme Court has been equally decisive, which requires a strong indictment base to justify the formal petition to the Chamber of Parliament, thus allowing a previous investigation to support the petition, without precautionary measures or evidence-searching activities against the MP when they amount to material indictment. The new article 118 bis of the law of criminal prosecution, by which the parliamentarian must enjoy rights equal to all the accused, contributes to the same result. Privileged jurisdiction in criminal matters for the MPs in the Supreme Court, has thus been the key in this evolution of immunity prerogative. But while the second has ceased to be controversial, the first is increasingly so. Immunity and privileged jurisdiction for MPs, form a system; should the second disappear, the first could come back to the front pages, in a new boom phase of numerous petitions for indictment and frequent denials...