On legislative proposals for the enforcement of the right of assembly

On legislative proposals for the enforcement of the right of assembly

Although in recent years Máté Szabó has witnessed significant progress in the enforcement of the right of assembly, he is still waiting for the implementation of some of his legislative proposals which would strengthen the guarantees for this fundamental freedom.

Since 2008 the Ombudsman has inquired into several hundred events held in public places and discovered numerous improprieties related to fundamental rights. The police's practice relative to the right of peaceful assembly has gradually evolved in recent years. Fundamental right-friendly solutions that not only make assembly possible but also facilitate its implementation have become more and more typical. Despite the favourable trends in the application of law, however, there are still several improprieties waiting to be redressed that cannot be remedied but through legislation.

In his 2008 report, the Commissioner proposed the codification of regulations addressing competing assemblies, i.e. assemblies held close to each other in space and time. During the last five years, he suggested on several occasions that a statute should specify the earliest date and time when an event could be given notice of. The rules for considering such notices are specified by a decree of the minister of interior dating back to 1990; their revision has been dragging on for years now.

Máté Szabó established back in 2009 that the classification of "armed attendance" and "attendance with a weapon" as reasons for dispersal is inexact, prompting uncertainty, thus constitutes a permanent and direct threat of infringement of the right of peaceful assembly.

Based on his investigations of many years, the Commissioner for Fundamental Rights pointed out that law enforcement's practice vis‑à‑vis reasons for banning, specified by the Act on Freedom of Assembly, is contradictory. In the case of various events that were to be held in the same public place, the police acknowledged some and banned others referring, on the basis of the same traffic data, to the lack of alternative thoroughfare. It is unclear on what considerations such decisions are made. An outsider might easily come to a conclusion that the police applied the reason for banning as a kind of public order clause. The Ombudsman requested the competent minister to consider the amendment of the relevant statute in accordance with the European standards of fundamental rights.

The proposal formulated in late 2012, requesting the minister of interior and the minister of public administration and justice to consider the possibility of drafting an unambiguous, still respecting the local governments' regulatory autonomy, skeleton statute on the local governments' competences and regulatory options relative to the use of public places, is also related to the enforcement of the right of assembly. There used to be some uncertainty as to the handling of events held under the Act on Freedom of Assembly or with a permission to use a public place, e.g. concerning the police's competences in securing public order and ensuring the exercise of the right of assembly depending on various classifications of the same public place.