Parliamentary privileges and the free exercise of parliamentary function within the italian constitutional experience: recent history of a constant quest for balance between powers and rights

Abstract

Parliamentary privileges of freedom of speech and inviolability are constitutional provisions necessary to ensure balancing between constitutional powers.

The Italian Constitutional legal order shows that there should be neither an exclusive and full parliamentary jurisdiction on privileges neither a full power of judges in applying constitutional rules on parliamentary privileges: it is within the System of Judicial Guarantees of the Constitution that parliamentary privileges have the chance to be effective within a correct balance between constitutional powers. Regrettably, the Italian System of Constitutional Guarantees does not ensure a sufficient level of protection of rights of persons violated by abuses of parliamentary privileges (see the European Court of Human Rights case law concerning art. 68 par. 1 Cost. it. concerning freedom of speech in Parliament).