The debate over judges’ salaries returned to the Laws Committee with a clear admission from the government: Parliament has missed the deadline to intervene. However, Justice Minister Toni Gogu argued that the delay should not be used as a justification for shifting powers, defending the official position that only Parliament can determine the salary formula by law.
Admission of the delay and a call for swift action
At the meeting of the Laws Committee, Gogu said Parliament’s deadline had expired on July 31. He acknowledged responsibility for the delay, but argued that the new initiative is intended to correct the inaction without creating, in his view, a clash between branches of power.
The minister said there is no need for political justifications over the missed deadline and called for the intervention to be made quickly. In the same vein, he expressed regret for the judicial and administrative staff who, according to him, carried the burden during the month of August despite having no connection to this institutional conflict.
The government insists: only Parliament sets the salary formula
The core of the minister’s position was that the debate should not be seen as a matter of figures, but as a matter of powers. According to the version he presented, the Constitutional Court has determined that the salary formula for magistrates must be approved by Parliament and only by law.
Gogu argued that the vacuum created by Parliament’s inaction cannot be filled by other actors taking over those powers. He insisted that any salary formula affecting the State Budget remains within the domain of the legislature, making the issue also a debate over control of public money.
The Constitutional Court ruling at the center of the clash
The minister acknowledged that the argument that Parliament’s silence could undo the consequences of a Constitutional Court ruling is a serious one and should not be trivialized. But he added that a ruling requiring the intervention of the legislature, in his view, can be implemented only through the law and not through other means.
At this point, the government is trying to preserve the balance between the obligation to implement the Constitutional Court’s ruling and the need, in its view, not to allow a distortion of the constitutional order of powers. This leaves open the question of why the deadline was allowed to expire without a timely solution.
“Independence without accountability” and the government’s political signal
At the end of his remarks, Gogu broadened the debate beyond salaries, returning to familiar theses of the justice reform. He cited integrity, accountability and efficiency as the three pillars set in 2016, while claiming that accountability has lagged behind.
His strongest statement was that “independence without accountability slides toward irresponsibility.” The political message is clear: the government is linking the discussion on salaries to a broader debate on how the justice system functions, presenting the demand to respect Parliament’s powers as part of this institutional balance.
The issue of judges’ salaries thus remains not only a debate over the implementation of a constitutional ruling, but also a concrete test of how institutions respond when deadlines are missed and responsibilities are dispersed.
Beyond the statements made in committee, the core of the debate remains unchanged: who bears the political and legal burden when Parliament delays, while the consequences of decision-making weigh directly on the budget and the functioning of the justice system.