HUN-1994-3-018
a)  Hungary / b)  Constitutional Court / c) / d)  17-11-1994 / e)  57/1994 / f) / g)  Magyar Közlöny (Official Gazette), 113/1994 / h) .
 
Keywords of the systematic thesaurus:
 
 
General Principles - Certainty of the law.
General Principles - General interest.
Institutions - Federalism, regionalism and local self-government - Municipalities.
Institutions - Federalism, regionalism and local self-government - Basic principles - Autonomy.
Institutions - Federalism, regionalism and local self-government - Budgetary and financial aspects - Budget.
Fundamental Rights - General questions - Entitlement to rights - Legal persons - Public law.
Fundamental Rights - Civil and political rights - Non-retrospective effect of law.
Fundamental Rights - Civil and political rights - Right to property.
 
Keywords of the alphabetical index:
 
Real estate, local government / Local self-government, property.
 
Headnotes:
 
Local governments are free to dispose of their own property within the limits determined by law; the appropriation of their incomes resulting from the sale of flats can be determined by reference to the public interest.
 
Intervention by the legislature in the budget of local governments during the fiscal year, without compensation, constitutes retroactive legislation that violates the constitutional principles of the rule of law and legal certainty.
 
Summary:
 
In 1993 the Constitutional Court declared unconstitutional several provisions of the law on the leasing and the alienation of living accommodation (flats) and other premises. (See Bulletin 1993/3, 22). Thus, Parliament amended the Act in 1994. The amended law was challenged in several petitions. The Constitutional Court declared unconstitutional and annulled two provisions of the amended law. These provisions regulated the utilisation of income of the local governments stemming from the sale of flats and other premises. (Real estate went from being State property to local governments' property in 1990.) Under the law, the appropriation of the incomes in question is strictly limited; furthermore, in the capital, the districts are obliged to deposit fifty percent of the income to the account of the municipality. The Court found constitutional the intervention in the appropriation of the local governments' income in the public interest in the case of flats. However, the Court declared a violation of legal certainty, and consequently of the rule of law, in the retroactive interference in the budget of the local governments, so it suspended the applicability of the respective provisions of the law until the end of the fiscal year. Moreover, the Court did not accept the same argument in the case of other premises, and annulled the respective provisions. The other challenged provisions of the law were upheld by the Court.
 
One judge wrote a dissenting opinion.
 
Languages:
 
Hungarian.