The Polish Ombudsman (Rzecznik Praw Obywatelskich), Dr. Marcin Wiącek, has issued a legal opinion on the so-called “rule of law” bill proposed by Minister of Justice Waldemar Żurek. In his statement, Wiącek stressed that the draft is internally inconsistent and based on a false premise—namely, that judges appointed after March 6, 2018, “were not judges at all under the law, including the Constitution.”
Żurek’s “Rule of Law” Bill
Earlier this month, Justice Minister Waldemar Żurek presented the draft of what he called the “rule of law act.” Prepared by the Codification Commission chaired by Krystian Markiewicz from the Iustitia judges’ association, the document is, according to its authors, intended to reform the judiciary and eliminate—what the government describes as—the problem of “neo-judges.”
The main objective of the “rule of law” bill is to re-run judicial appointment competitions for all positions filled through the National Council of the Judiciary (KRS) since March 2018 and to “regularize” the status of judges allegedly appointed “illegally” between 2018 and 2025. The key provision would reinstate around 1,200 people to their last official posts and require them to take part in a repeated competition for the same positions they currently hold.
The Tusk government’s proposal has sparked strong protests among legal circles.
President Karol Nawrocki also spoke out critically about Żurek’s initiative, saying, “What Minister Żurek has recently done is far from encouraging.”
“He is blatantly violating the law and the Constitution, so Minister Żurek’s proposals will, of course, be analyzed by the Chancellery of the President. However, his recent conduct has not shown that he wishes to be a serious partner in dialogue with the President of Poland. This should never have happened,”
said President Nawrocki.
Ombudsman on Żurek’s Bill: “An Internally Inconsistent Project”
The Ombudsman’s analysis of Żurek’s “rule of law” bill brought similarly negative conclusions. Dr. Wiącek pointed out that the draft relies on the mistaken assumption that individuals appointed as judges after March 6, 2018, are not judgeswithin the meaning of law or the Constitution.
He emphasized that this claim finds no support in the case law of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) or the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU)—nor in the jurisprudence of Polish courts, including the Supreme Court and the Supreme Administrative Court (NSA).
While Wiącek agreed that the status of judges appointed after that date indeed requires clarification and regulation, he stressed that such a process must take place within constitutional and international standards.
The Ombudsman also pointed to the draft’s internal inconsistency: on one hand, it treats the National Council of the Judiciary (KRS) as a “non-existent” body and invalidates its resolutions; on the other, it acknowledges its capacity to issue binding decisions elsewhere in the text.
According to Wiącek, the mass annulment of KRS resolutions and the automatic dismissal or transfer of around 1,500 judges—without proper judicial proceedings and alongside the public disclosure of their personal data—would violate the principle of proportionality, the rule of law, the irremovability of judges, the right to a fair trial, the protection of reputation, and the right to an effective remedy.
Wiącek warned that such measures would likely prompt affected judges to seek protection from the European Court of Human Rights, and given the Court’s current jurisprudence, there is a high probability that it would find violations of the Convention. As a result, implementing the bill could deepen Poland’s judicial crisis and trigger new disputes over the status of Polish judges.
Additionally, the Ombudsman highlighted that the proposed special procedure allowing for the automatic annulment of certain rulings issued with the participation of post-2018 judges—even when such rulings were substantively correct—undermines the principle of legal certainty and the stability of legal relations.