În articolul de față ne propunem să prezentăm câteva considerații critice asupra Deciziei nr. 685/2018 a Curții Constituționale pronunțate recent1. Trebuie să precizăm, în acest sens, că nu împărtășim soluția asupra admisibilității cererii de constatare a existenței unui conflict juridic de natură constituțională, dar suntem parțial de acord cu soluția pe fond și nu împărtășim unele considerații din motivarea instanței constituționale. În ceea ce privește admisibilitatea cererii primului-ministru, suntem de părere că nu ne aflăm în prezența unui conflict de natură constituțională, ci a unuia de natură legală. Așa cum Curtea însăși a definit conflictul juridic de natură constituțională în deciziile sale anterioare2 și cum o reamintește și în prezenta decizie, este necesar ca autoritatea „pârâtă” să-și aroge competențe care îi aparțin autorității „reclamante” sau alteia sau să refuze să-și exercite propriile atribuții, iar aceasta să ducă la blocaje instituționale3; în fine, în prezenta decizie apare pentru prima dată și cerința ca blocajul să nu poată fi înlăturat în alt mod4.

The study refers to the way in which national criminal processual legislation provides safeguards regarding the respect for the right to a fair trial, with particular reference to the obligation of the courts of law to properly motivate the solutions they pronounce in solving the merits or even the ordinary remedy of appeal. From the research made, the author concludes that the European standards do not find an explicit consecration in the current national legislation and identifies situations from the recent case law in which the courts have directly applied the European conventional provisions, by abolishing the sentences analyzed and sending the case for retrial by the same court even without Article 421 (2) b) of the Criminal Procedure Code providing such a case. The author proposes that it should be completed de lege ferenda the text itself previously invoked by including a case which should refer to the failure to provide proper motivation for the sentence of the court examining the merits and he continues the argumentation by proposing the extension in the same way also of the cases in which an review in cassation may be lodged against the decisions of the courts of appeal. The conclusion he reaches has in view the fact that the two legislative amendments would be likely to provide adequate safeguards to the right to a fair trial in criminal matters, without the need to resort to conventional provisions which should be conferred direct applicability, a solution often avoided by the courts in this field.

The law provides that all declared claims will be subject to the verification procedure, with the exception of claims established by enforceable court judgments and enforceable arbitral awards, as well as budgetary claims resulting from an uncontested enforcement title within the time limits provided by special laws. In case the court judgments or arbitral awards are annulled, quashed or modified in the means of appeal, the judicial administrator/judicial liquidator will restore the table of claims accordingly. In case the court, by annulling or quashing the judgment, does not settle also the merits of the case, the judicial administrator or the judicial liquidator will proceed to the verification of that claim, by notifying the creditors in the event of total or partial non-inclusion of the claim, the creditors having, against the measure of the practitioner, in the Bulletin of Insolvency Procedures the extract of the report of the judicial administrator or of the judicial liquidator in which that measure is described. The judicial administrator will proceed immediately to the verification of each application and of accompanying documents and will conduct a thorough investigation to determine the legitimacy, the exact value and priority of each claim. For this purpose, the insolvent practitioner has the right to request explanations from the debtor, will be able to discuss with each debtor, requesting additional information and documents, if he considers it necessary. The regulation included in paragraph (2) of Article 106 of the Insolvency Code has an absolute novelty character, because until the appearance of the Law No 85/2014 the judicial administrator/judicial liquidator did not have the right to establish that the extinctive prescription of the claim has arisen. This is provided that, in the conception of the new Civil Code, the prescription can only be invoked by the one in whose favour it runs. Therefore, if the insolvent practitioner will appreciate that for the amount of money declared by a creditor within the procedure the extinctive prescription has arisen, he will notify the creditor in that regard, without further checks on the pretended claim, the legislator considering that in this case it acts, although it is a body applying the procedure, as a representative of the insolvent debtor, obviously with the possibility of the creditor interested in challenging the measure to the syndic-judge. As a result of the verifications made, the judicial administrator/liquidator will draw up and register with the court a preliminary table containing all claims against the debtor’s estate, overdue or not, under condition or under dispute, arisen before the date of the opening procedure. In the table there will be mentioned both the amount requested by the creditor and the amount accepted and the priority rank, and in the case of the creditor undergoing the insolvency procedure the appointed judicial administrator/judicial liquidator will also be indicated. In the case of the simplified procedure, in this table the claims arisen after the opening of the procedure and until the moment of going into bankruptcy will be recorded. In the case of claims which benefit from a preference cause, there will be presented the title from which the right of preference arises, its rank and, if applicable, the reasons for which the claims have been partially recorded in the table or have been removed. The claims that are benefiting from a preference case shall be entered in the preliminary table with the full value, indicating at the same time the title from which the preference right arises, their rank and, if applicable, the reasons for which the claims were only partially recorded in the table or have been removed, and in the final table, up to the market value of the guarantee determined by assessment, ordered by the judicial administrator or by the judicial liquidator, by an authorized assessor. However, Article 122 (1) of the Framework-Law makes the drawing up of the final table of claims conditional upon the handover by the assessor of the guarantee assessment report. In case the capitalization of the assets over which the preferential cause takes effect will be made at a price higher than the amount entered in the final consolidated table, the positive difference will be assigned to the guaranteed creditor, even if a part of his claim had been recorded as a secured debt, until covering the main claim and the accessories that will be calculated according to the documents from which the claim arises, until the date of the capitalization of assets. This provision will also be applied in case of failure of the reorganization plan and the sale of the asset in the insolvency procedure.

The legislation on the matter of stamp duties, although it should be free of problems of interpretation, is no exception to the fact that the interpretation is the one that generates problems in the application of legal norms. The related controversies reveal that the current regulation inclusive is far from the desideratum to maintain a fair balance between the public interest to collect these budgetary resources in the quantum envisaged by the legislator and the interest of the litigant not to have the relevant legislation interpreted to his detriment. There are difficulties concerning the determination in practice of the actions which the legislator regulates generically by formulating „cash assessable actions and claims”, a phrase used in Article 3 (1) of the Government Emergency Ordinance No 80/2013. The same situation we encounter in the case of applications determined by the phrase „applications not assessable in cash”, phrase used in Article 27 of the Government Emergency Ordinance No 80/2013, with which the legislator intends to cover all the categories of applications not regulated in the previous texts. Other difficulties, revealed inclusively by the decisions of the High Court of Cassation and Justice, concern the interpretation of the phrase „different finality”, used in Article 34 (1) of the Government Emergency Ordinance No 80/2013, for the situation of the actions with multiple claims. Since these three phrases evoke genuine principles underlying the manner of regulation used by the legislator in the matter, by the controversies reviewed, the study argues either the necessity of the minimum approach of defining the terms contained therein by the author of the normative act, or that of rewriting it pursuant to an inventory of the objects of the claims encountered in the judicial practice. This inventory is easy to obtain by the legislator from the courts, with the necessity to update it, after taking over in the normative act of domain, either by the regulations that generate new categories of applications addressed to the justice, or by amending accordingly the normative act having as object exclusively the stamp duty fees. However, this regulatory manner is used by the legislator in the legislation by which it establishes tax obligations, duties and taxes respectively. It is easy to imagine the implications of some norms susceptible to interpretation in this latter matter, which, in essence, has the same nature as the one in question.

Information technology changed the way we relate to information as any data posted on the Internet can remain accessible indefinitely. On the one hand this ease of access undoubtedly was beneficial for the freedom of expression and information, but on the other hand the fundamental right to privacy of natural persons seems under threat in the absence of an adequate legal mechanism that would ensure that their past will not haunt them ad vitam aeternam. Last year, the French Council of State has requested the European Court of Justice (ECJ) for a preliminary ruling on the territorial scope of the right to be digitally forgotten. Although, since the Google Spain case, EU citizens enjoy an online right to be forgotten, its territorial application is yet to be determined. As such, this paper discusses the Opinion of the Advocate General in the Google Case (C-507/17), opinion which could offer a glimpse into the future ruling of the ECJ on this matter. In our analysis, we will also show the reasons why the ECJ’s decision is only a step in defining the right to digital oblivion, not at all an end point.

The objective of this study is to nuance practical problems that may arise in the application of the provisions of the Civil Code in matters of the right of preference to tenancy. In the absence of some exhaustive legal norms (Article 1828 of the Civil Code making reference to the provisions of the right of preemption that must be properly applied), we consider that it is inevitable that in the hypothesis of a litigation there are no divergent interpretations which have as source unclear rules that govern this matter. We have focused, primarily, on identifying the compatibility of the provisions of the preemption right with that of the right of preference, being essential the correct interpretation of the phrase „properly”. We later pointed out the holders of this right and the conditions that must be met in order for this to may be exercised. More specifically, we have leaned on the analysis of a condition whose limits are not clearly laid down by the law: what does it mean the obligativity for the tenant to perform the obligations on the basis of the previous rental and whether the notion of non-performance also includes the delay in performing the obligations. In addition, we have analyzed the nature and moment from which the exercise of the right begins to run, considering that particular issues are raised by the notification which the lessor is obliged to send to the lessee in view of exercising the right of preference, since the moment of communication thereof is also the one from which the term of exercise of the right begins to run. We have identified two judgments expressing two fundamentally different views referring to what the content of the notification must be, analyzing the arguments of both courts and exposing our own point of view. Last but not least, in terms of the differences between the contract of sale and the one of tenancy, our approach has continued by pointing out how to exercise the right of preference, respectively of the amount of rent that must be recorded and the moment when the recording must be made – which, from our point of view, differs from those in the matter of preemption. We have concluded with the moment when the new rental agreement was signed, along with the effects it produces. We hope that this study will prove useful to be to practitioners in particular, as we have tried to answer questions and provide explanations where the legislation and doctrine have not done it so far, although the questions have already arisen in practice, imperiously requiring an answer.