Parliament Begins Regular Autumn Session on Friday

The Croatian Parliament will begin its new, fifth session and regular autumn session on Friday, after a two-month break, with the current morning session.

The Parliament of the new session usually starts on Wednesdays, but this time it will exceptionally start on Friday.

Start of the session in accordance with constitutional deadline

– We start on September 15, in accordance with the constitutional deadline. The important thing is that next week Prime Minister Andrej Plenković will be at the UN General Assembly, and since we have to start with the current morning session, if we do not start on Friday, we would only start on September 27, which would be unacceptable and would meet with public condemnation, explained the President of the Parliament Gordan Jandroković recently.

The current morning session will be opened with a question by independent MP and representative of national minorities Veljko Kajtazi, and it will be closed by Zlatko Hasanbegović, a representative of the party Independents for Croatia. A total of 39 representatives wish to ask questions to the Prime Minister and ministers.

Next working week, the Parliament will, instead of on Wednesday, start already on Tuesday when it will discuss seven audit reports that address the effectiveness of the public procurement system in trading companies, the financial side of political party operations, procurement efficiency, and the rules for using official cars by budget users, etc.

On the agenda, more than a hundred items

The fifth session will last until the end of October, and representatives have been proposed an agenda that currently includes more than a hundred items, of which about 60 are various reports for the past and the year before.

With special interest, the first report from Prime Minister Plenković on the state of the nation is awaited, probably at the end of September. Parliamentary representatives and the entire public will hear the Prime Minister’s assessment of the first year of his mandate, announced Jandroković.

>>>Rearview Mirror: Soon a Year Since Plenković Presented Major Government Plans

The Parliament is awaiting reports from the President of the Supreme Court on the state of the judiciary and on the work of the State Attorney’s Office for the past and the year before. Also on the agenda are reports from the Ombudsperson, as well as the Ombudsperson for Children and for Persons with Disabilities for the past year.

During the autumn, representatives will express their opinions on numerous legislative proposals, including the new Law on the Rights of Croatian Veterans from the Homeland War, and the proposal to postpone the implementation of the property tax.

Election of Constitutional Court Judges

They should complete the composition of the Constitutional Court, that is, elect three judges, which they did not do last summer when the opposition SDP conditioned the already agreed election of Miroslav Šeparović, Mate Arlović, and Goran Selanac with the establishment of a parliamentary investigative committee for Agrokor. According to unofficial information, the SDP has since withdrawn its conditioning of support.

>>>HNS: Establishing an Investigative Committee for Agrokor ‘Raises Doubts’ About the Work of the State Attorney’s Office

As they enter the new working season, representatives are aware that they will be fined 150 kuna per day for each unjustified absence from the session. The first fines for absences in July have already been imposed, with 26 out of 151 representatives receiving them, resulting in their allowances for August being reduced from 150 kuna to as much as 1350 kuna, as in the case of SDP’s Ivan Klarin, who was absent for nine days.

The Croatian Parliament regularly meets twice a year – between January 15 and July 15, and between September 15 and December 15.