TrustHLT/LaCour huggingface dataset:
AP1 (Applicant): They placed great reliance on the court's finding in the first Harabin decision in 2002.
AP1 (Applicant): However, this decision has been outdated by the Eskalinan judgment.
AP1 (Applicant): According to the subsequent case law, the very nature of the applicant's position in itself cannot justify any exclusion of access to a court in respect of dismissal.
AP1 (Applicant): The government also drew a parallel between the applicant and the public prosecutors who exercise discretionary powers intrinsic to state sovereignty that justifies the exclusion of their right of access to court.
AP1 (Applicant): But this approach is not correct.
AP1 (Applicant): We share more of the opinion set forth in the excellent summary of the third party intervener international commission of jurists.
AP1 (Applicant): We do believe that the power exercised by a judge, although essentially of a public nature, is both structurally and inherently distinct from that of public servants of the executive.
AP1 (Applicant): Judges, unlike other public officials, enjoy specific guarantees due to the requirement of judicial independence.
AP1 (Applicant): In addition, although the applicant as the highest judicial office holder performed some special tasks from the perspective of the separation of powers, his role was substantially no different from other judges and court executives.
AP1 (Applicant): He did not have a stronger bond of trust and loyalty with the state than his colleagues and fellow court executives, whose right of access to court is not disputed by the respondent state.
AP1 (Applicant): He shared the very same judicial independence.
AP1 (Applicant): The conclusion may be drawn that the applicant's legal status did not involve any special exercise of discretionary powers intrinsic to state sovereignty to the extent that would justify the exclusion of his access to court as regards his removal.
AP1 (Applicant): But again, his access to court, rather than being excluded, was clearly guaranteed by the domestic law.
AP1 (Applicant): We invite, therefore, the court to hold that Article VI applies in the present case and has been violated on account of the applicant's deprival of his right of access to tribunal.
AP1 (Applicant): Turning now to Article X, the government insists that there was no interference with the applicant's freedom of expression since his term of office was terminated because of the fundamental changes in the functions of the supreme judicial authority in Hungary.
AP1 (Applicant): But this argument hardly seems to be persuasive.
AP1 (Applicant): Firstly, because this argument emerged no sooner than in the respondent state written submission in the present case, before and during the legislation process, and even afterwards, no official or non-official declaration was put forward explaining the applicant's removal by any fundamental structural changes.
AP1 (Applicant): Secondly, at the material time, I mean in the course of events, dozens of articles, declarations, and opinions, both in Hungary and abroad, raised the issue of a clear causal link between the applicant's utterances and his removal.
AP1 (Applicant): In contrast to that, the government didn't even try to confute this general opinion.
AP1 (Applicant): Certainly, had the real motive been different, the government would have paid the utmost attention to dispel the guise and suspicion by communicating their arguments.
AP1 (Applicant): Thirdly, it is legitimate to raise the question, once an organization goes through as dramatic changes as the government suggests, why only its head must be removed?
AP1 (Applicant): What is more, why did this person become immediately excluded by a newly introduced criterion from being even a candidate to the presidency of the new legal successor institution?
AP1 (Applicant): This gave rise to a suspicion that an individual measure was made.
AP1 (Applicant): And this suspicion is even more substantiated if the removal of that specific person is accompanied by the immediate and total abrogation of his legal post-term benefits.
AP1 (Applicant): The government and the applicant have a dispute whether there has been a fundamental change in the structure and functions of the Supreme Judicial Authority.
AP1 (Applicant): Based on the written material provided, we do assert that there weren't any substantial changes.
AP1 (Applicant): And the Curia is not a new judicial body in Hungary, but is nothing else than the Supreme Court renamed.
AP1 (Applicant): That is to say, it remains the Supreme Judicial Authority of the country.
AP1 (Applicant): The government, in turn, rely on two new competencies, which, in their view, changed fundamentally its functions.
AP1 (Applicant): However, it is not convincing at all.
AP1 (Applicant): Firstly, because securing unity of the jurisprudence is not at all a new competence.
AP1 (Applicant): It had been one of the Supreme Court's tasks ever since its existence.
AP1 (Applicant): Secondly, the only new competence, namely, supervising local government legislation, does not mean more than merely about 60 to 70 new cases amongst around 8,000 cases arriving yearly to the Curia.
AP1 (Applicant): A similarly marginal change would surely not justify the termination of the mandate of any court president.
AP1 (Applicant): In addition, all other judges and court executives of the Supreme Court, with the exception of the vice president, the trustee of the applicant, remained in office.
AP1 (Applicant): And pending cases were to be handled by the same chambers without any change.
AP1 (Applicant): We don't ask this court to take a stand to qualify the nature of these changes, because even assuming that the Supreme Court and the Curia were different in terms of their organization and structure, those two bodies are, in a sense, entrusted with identical tasks.
AP1 (Applicant): For this reason, a mere change in the institutional model cannot justify the premature removal of the applicant.
AP1 (Applicant): Moreover, even in case of such a change, transitional measures should have entrusted the applicant the possibility to serve his term of office in full.
AP1 (Applicant): I emphasize again, as we did in paragraph 49 of our memorial, the rulings of the European Court of Justice in the case of Hungarian data protection supervisor.
AP1 (Applicant): In that case, the Luxembourg court clearly stated that member states were free to adopt or amend the institutional model.
AP1 (Applicant): However, they had to ensure the independence of the supervisory authority, which entails the obligation to allow the supervisor to serve its full term office.
AP1 (Applicant): This principled ruling on the required security of tenure shall a fortiori be applicable to a Supreme Court president.
AP1 (Applicant): Consequently, the argument of the government referring to the structural changes in the Supreme Court's functions cannot in any case justify the premature termination of the applicant's mandate.
AP1 (Applicant): Mr. President, honorable judges, the government
AP1 (Applicant): tried to sell the idea that the applicant was not suitable to lead the courier.
AP1 (Applicant): That was the reason why he had been dismissed.
AP1 (Applicant): Additionally, in their memorial, they attempt to undermine the high moral standing and the competency of the applicant.
AP1 (Applicant): I'm not going to follow the government on that disgraceful avenue.
AP1 (Applicant): I would simply remind you that the applicant's professional qualities and his ability have never been called into question during his term of office.
AP1 (Applicant): Whatever the respondent government may say, the facts speak for themselves.
AP1 (Applicant): Notably, the applicant was elected and twice re-elected to a high international judicial position under three different governments, both left and right wings, including the first cabinet of the present prime minister.
AP1 (Applicant): Then he was elected with the support of the competent judicial authority, president of the Supreme Court, for a six-year term by an 86% parliamentary majority, also including the current governing parties.
AP1 (Applicant): The pity political games the parties played around his election fall outside of the applicant's responsibility.
AP1 (Applicant): What is more, in 2011, he was unanimously elected for president of the network of the presidents of the Supreme Judicial Courts of the European Union.
AP1 (Applicant): And in 2012, he has been elected as honorary president of this network.
AP1 (Applicant): Given the reality, when the government suggests that the applicant was not suitable for his position, we are persuaded that this suitability must be understood politically rather than professionally.
AP1 (Applicant): This interpretation is completely confirmed by the shocking content of paragraph 44 of the government's memorial, where they made it clear that they considered the applicant's position as a political function and the applicant as a political actor.
AP1 (Applicant): Moreover, they considered themselves as the employer of the head of judiciary.
AP1 (Applicant): The government didn't left the slightest doubt that they regard the applicant's expressions as political expressions.
AP1 (Applicant): They cannot stand.
AP1 (Applicant): And therefore, the removal from office was the consequence of purely political considerations.
AP1 (Applicant): Honorable members of the court, no doubt that the respondent state interfered with the applicant's freedom of expression.
AP1 (Applicant): This interference, however, wasn't prescribed by law because tailor-made abusive legislation cannot ever satisfy the conventional requirements as to the quality of law.
AP1 (Applicant): Furthermore, its aim was to sanction the applicant for simply fulfilling his duty to express opinion on judicial matters.
AP1 (Applicant): This aim cannot be recognized as legitimate.
AP1 (Applicant): What is more, the necessity of such interference is hardly explicable in a democratic society.
AP1 (Applicant): This court held in the Hendyside case that freedom of expression constitutes one of the essential foundations of a democratic society.
AP1 (Applicant): It is important to underline that expression of the applicant's views was not for his personal benefit at all, but had a more general purpose, protecting the independence and the proper functioning of the judiciary.
AP1 (Applicant): The issues concerning the functioning of the justice system constitute questions of public interest, a debate of which enjoys the protection of Article 10.
AP1 (Applicant): In response to this criticism, punitive measures of interference have been adopted against the applicant.
AP1 (Applicant): Moreover, this court cannot ignore the chilling effect of these measures on the exercise of freedom of expression by other independent high officials and the whole judiciary.
AP1 (Applicant): The applicant formulated his arguments in order to protect the very basics of the rule of law.
AP1 (Applicant): Those state measures that operate against such an activity cannot ever be regarded as necessary in a democratic society.
AP1 (Applicant): As a final observation, let me turn to the issue of the just satisfaction.
AP1 (Applicant): We have to be clear at this point by saying that the applicant's claims under Article 41 are the direct consequences of the violation of Article 10 of the Convention.
AP1 (Applicant): Namely, in reprisal for the views he expressed, the applicant's term of office was terminated, and as an additional punishment, all of his statutory guaranteed post-term entitlements were abolished with extreme rapidity.
AP1 (Applicant): These measures constitute together a single punitive package.
AP1 (Applicant): This package of sanctions was a direct consequence of the applicant's utterances.
AP1 (Applicant): Since the 13 Turkish Grand Chamber cases of 1999, this court has repeatedly recognized that even eventual finding of a violation of Article 10 necessarily entails the reparation of all damages which are direct consequences of it.
AP1 (Applicant): My client was penalized by two kinds of sanctions.
AP1 (Applicant): He was removed from his position, entailing the loss of his presidential remunerations, and was deprived of his lawful post-term benefits.
AP1 (Applicant): I see no reason in the present case to depart from the well-established case law.
AP1 (Applicant): Consequently, both losses need to be reimbursed as pecuniary damages suffered by the applicant.
AP1 (Applicant): It is important to note that the provision regulating the applicant's before-mentioned entitlements were basic elements of his statutory service conditions.
AP1 (Applicant): These conditions were already in force at the time of his appointment and remained unchanged until he was removed.
AP1 (Applicant): In addition, the applicant fulfilled all criteria for the disbursement of all his entitlements so that their implementation would have been automated.
AP1 (Applicant): The amount claimed for damages is not speculative, but based on precise legal provisions.
AP1 (Applicant): The retroactive abrogation of the post-term benefits affected only the applicant.
AP1 (Applicant): We enclosed to our memorial under Annex 8 a table which clearly shows that all public officials falling under the same law are still receiving their statutory post-term remunerations.
AP1 (Applicant): It is worth noting that the period of office of these former officials terminated before 1st of January 2012, similarly to the applicant, and all of them have obtained their post-term office entitlements, including their pensions, even if they reach the pensionable age long after granting the force of the new rules in 2012.
AP1 (Applicant): The applicant is the only exception.
AP1 (Applicant): The before-mentioned factual elements supported by scores of evidences led to the conclusion that the applicant's retroactive deprivation of his remuneration and other benefits simultaneously with his dismissal was not only a matter of coincidence, but the result of a last-minute legislative measure tailored to him alone.
AP1 (Applicant): They followed a purely punitive purpose, that is, the retaliation for the applicant's persisting and principled criticism.
AP1 (Applicant): The resulting pecuniary damage as a direct consequence is thus inextricably linked to the breach of the applicant's rights under Article 10 of the Convention.
AP1 (Applicant): international organizations listed in our memorial have already taken a firm stance declaring that measures concerning the termination of the applicant's term of office, and I'm quoting here, are widely seen as being solely adopted to dismiss the sitting president of the Supreme Court and are considered as an attempt to get rid of a specific person who in the past had been critical of the government's policy of judicial reform.
AP1 (Applicant): They all agree that this dismissal, a kind of sanction, was politically motivated and violates the guarantee of security of tenure, which is a key element of the independence of the judiciary.
AP1 (Applicant): We share these opinions and the principles behind them.
AP1 (Applicant): We strongly believe that political demands on the judiciary and evaluation of judges by political standards may never come back again in Europe.
AP1 (Applicant): On this basis, we respectfully request the court to hold that there has been a violation of the invoked provisions of the Convention.
Luis López Guerra (JudgeP): Thank you Mr. Cech. Now I call Mr. Tallódi to the floor.
GR1 (Government): Since for a long time, this is the first case from Hungary heard by the court.
GR1 (Government): I avail myself of this opportunity to express to the court the highest respect of my government.
GR1 (Government): Concerning the present case, it can be stated that during the written procedure before the court, both parties have been given ample opportunity to put forward their arguments.
GR1 (Government): Hence, it is not necessary to repeat now the details of the position of the government outlined recently in the memorial of the 8th of April, 2015.
GR1 (Government): First of all, let me reaffirm that the government, similarly to the intervening third parties, consider that the independence of the judiciary is an important guarantee of the rule of law, which principle is clearly enshrined in the fundamental law of Hungary and which was fully taken into account in drafting and amending the new laws governing the organization of the judicial system in Hungary.
GR1 (Government): In fact, the provision itself, which made the applicant ineligible to be elected as president of the Courier, was introduced in order to increase the independence of the judiciary in accordance with the proposal of Hungarian judges.
GR1 (Government): With due respect to the applicant's professional achievements, Mr. Darak's professional qualities and achievements
GR1 (Government): were presented in the government's memorial in order to show that the new president of the Courier is a renowned judge of excellent professional qualities and to dissipate any doubts as to his suitability to personify the independence of the judiciary.
GR1 (Government): The government considered that the circumstances of the applicant's election as president of the Supreme Court are crucial to understanding the case.
GR1 (Government): Therefore, I briefly describe those circumstances and the nature of the functions the applicant was elected for.
GR1 (Government): Prior to his election as a judge of this honorable court, Mr. Baka didn't have any judicial experience in Hungary.
GR1 (Government): Due to the political nature of the selection and election as a judge of the court in 1991 and to the differences in the working methods of national trial courts and of an international court, respectively, the applicant's service at this court was not regarded by national courier judges as a judicial service of equal value, which is reflected by the fact that in May 2008, when the president of the republic first nominated Mr. Baka for president of the Supreme Court,
GR1 (Government): the National Council of Justice, a quasi-self-governing body of judicial administration, didn't find him professionally suitable for this position.
GR1 (Government): It was only after a one-year vacancy at the post of president of the Supreme Court when the president of the republic repeatedly nominated Mr. Baka
GR1 (Government): that he was elected in the third round of voting by the parliament.
GR1 (Government): By the time, in the context of the actual political situation in Hungary, the applicant's election became more of an issue of the authority of the president of the republic than of the professional suitability of the applicant.
GR1 (Government): It appears that two and a half years in his office couldn't make the Hungarian judiciary forget the circumstances of his election and the Hungarian Association of Judges, which is a civil society organization with a membership of about 1,600 judges, more than half of the number of the active judges in Hungary felt the need to propose stronger guarantees to be included in the new legislation in order to depoliticize the election process as much as possible and to limit the choice of politicians to a pre-existing pool of carrier judges subjected to strict rules of political independence.
GR1 (Government): At the time of the applicant's election as president of the Supreme Court, this function was combined with the functions of the president of the National Council of Justice, the head of administration of the judicial system.
GR1 (Government): Although now the applicant claims that it is not the first function which was accessorial to the letter, but the other way around, the government point out that at his first hearing on the 14th, May, 2008, at the Parliamentary Commission on Constitutional and Justice Affairs, before his election, he spoke at length about his ideas concerning the administration of the judicial system before making two short remarks about the tasks of the Supreme Court introduced by the following sentence.
GR1 (Government): Considering that I am a nominee to the post of president, not only of the National Council of Justice, but also of the Supreme Court, I would like to make only a few remarks as a candidate for the presidency of the Supreme Court.
GR1 (Government): The overwhelming majority of the questions put to him at the parliamentary hearing also related to his future tasks as president of the National Council of Justice.
GR1 (Government): The dominance of the letter functions in this hybrid post was also apparent in the actual work that was carried out by the applicant during his term of office.
GR1 (Government): In practice, Mr. Baca mostly performed representative tasks
GR1 (Government): as well as some managerial tasks as president of the National Council of Justice.
GR1 (Government): The statements on account of which his term of office was allegedly terminated were also made in his official capacity as president of the National Council of Justice.
GR1 (Government): It follows that since both Mr. Baca's election
GR1 (Government): and his activities were mostly connected with the functions of the president of the National Council of Justice, the president of the National Judicial Office is more appropriate to be regarded as his successor in his office than the president of the Courier after the termination of the applicant's hybrid office.
GR1 (Government): having set out the factual context of the case, I shall now turn to the issue of applicability of Article VI of the convention.
GR1 (Government): First of all, the government are of the opinion that the Eskalinan test, or at least its first condition, is not applicable to cases where flat denial of access to court is alleged.
GR1 (Government): It is evident from the contradictory nature of both the applicant's arguments and the chamber's reasoning.
GR1 (Government): The applicant complained that he had not had access to a court or any other body performing a judicial function that could be qualified as a court for the purposes of the Eskalinan test.
GR1 (Government): He argued that the constitution-making majority of the legislator deliberately chose to enact a legislative act at the highest level of the hierarchy of laws in order to preclude his access to the constitutional court.
GR1 (Government): And yet, he claims that the first condition of the Eskalinan test was not met because his right of access to court was excluded by domestic law.
GR1 (Government): The chamber found that the act complained of by the applicant was not subject to any form of judicial review, 75 paragraph of the judgment.
GR1 (Government): Yet, it concluded that access to court was not excluded by law.
GR1 (Government): In order to eliminate this confusion, the government requests the honorable grand chamber to find that the fundamental law is part of domestic law.
GR1 (Government): And if access to court is excluded by the rules of constitutional law, then it is excluded by law.
GR1 (Government): Therefore, even if the condition of the Eskalinan test is applicable, it should be considered satisfied.
GR1 (Government): The essence of the Eskalinan test is that when domestic law itself allows access to a court to challenge decisions concerning public servants, the civil law nature of the dispute concerned must be presumed.
GR1 (Government): And the government cannot rely on the public law nature of these disputes in order to exclude the applicability of Article 6, paragraph 1 of the convention in the proceedings before the court.
GR1 (Government): When access to court is not guaranteed by domestic law, it is the Pellegrin test which is still applicable.
GR1 (Government): Disputes raised by public servants whose duties typify the specific activities of the public service insofar as the latter is acting as the depository of public authority responsible for protecting the general interests of the state or other public authorities fall outside the scope of Article 6, paragraph 1 of the convention.
GR1 (Government): The second condition of the Eskalinan test, namely that the exclusion from access to court must be justified on objective grounds in the state's interest, is essentially a reverting of the Pellegrin test.