Prague, Aug 17 (CTK) – The Chamber of Deputies and the Senate, the lower and upper houses of Czech parliament, will be able to mutually modify changes to constitutional and election bills to achieve consensus under a bill on their relations that the Senate approved on Thursday after 25 years.
The Chamber of Deputies passed the legislation at the end of June.
President Milos Zeman is yet to sign the bill into law. Then it will take effect a year of its promulgation in the Digest of Laws.
The parliament will thereby finally meet the constitution which embeds the existence of this law.
The Senate agreed with the rules despite objections raised by opposition Civic Democrat (ODS) senators.
The most significant change is a new system of dealing with constitutional and election bills to enable the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate to mutually tune up their version and reach agreement on their content in compliance with the constitution.
At present, if the Senate does not approve a bill of the Chamber of Deputies and submits its own changes, the lower house must accept them if it wants the bill to make it through. Newly, deputies will be able to modify the Senate-proposed changes and submit them to senators for approval again.
The legislation enables the establishment of joint working groups of both chambers to deal with European regulations. They might include experts from the public as well.
The bill also modifies the selection of parliament representatives in interparliamentary institutions and sets general rules of joint session of the lower and upper house during a newly elected president’s oath.
