EU and Poland in clash over member state laws
THE European Union’s top official locked horns with Poland’s prime minister yesterday, arguing that a recent ruling from the country’s constitutional court challenging the supremacy of EU laws is a threat to the bloc’s foundations and will not be left unanswered.
European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen and Mateusz Morawiecki laid bare their differences of opinion on rule-of-law principles during a heated debate with EU politicians.
Ms von der Leyen accused Mr Morawiecki of trying to escape the debate on the primacy of European law. He in turn insisted that Poles are in favour of the “power of the rule of law” and “don’t believe in blackmail or paternalistic attitudes” toward their country.
Relations between Poland and the EU have been rocky for years and reached a new low earlier this month after the tribunal ruled that Polish laws take precedence over those of the 27-nation bloc - which Poland joined in 2004 - escalating lingering tensions over democratic standards between the country’s right-wing nationalist government and Brussels institutions.
In her introduction, Ms von der Leyen said the Polish ruling challenges “the unity of the European legal order” and undermines the protection of judicial independence.
“The rule of law is the glue that binds our union together,” Ms von der Leyen said.
At the heart of the dispute is the question of who should have the most power within the 27-nation bloc - each individual nation over its citizens, or the EU institutions over the member nations. It was the prime mover behind the exit of Britain from the EU, and it has stirred passions in several eastern and central European nations like Poland and Hungary.
Mr Morawiecki described Poland as a nation that is being intimidated and attacked by an EU whose top court issues rulings that aim to take more and more power away from its member states.
He insisted that the EU must remain a union of sovereign states until the time that all its members agree by treaty to give up more of their own national powers.
“We are now seeing a creeping revolution taking place by way of verdicts of the European Court of Justice,” he said.
Mr Morawiecki defended his country’s stance that the highest law of Poland is the country’s constitution and that stands above any other law.
The European Commission has several options to try to make Warsaw comply with EU law, notably by continuing to hold up the country’s access to billions of euros in European money.
“We cannot and we will not allow our common values to be put at risk. The commission will act,” Ms von der Leyen said.
But Ms von der Leyen said she is open to compromise.
“I have always been a proponent of dialogue and I will always be,” she said. “This is a situation that can and must be resolved. And we want a strong Poland in a united Europe.”
The stand-off started when the European Court of Justice ruled in March that Poland’s new regulations for appointing judges to the Supreme Court could violate EU law. The ruling obliged Poland’s government to discontinue the rules that gave politicians influence over judicial appointments. To date, Poland has not complied.