The direct election of the prime minister and the unresolved issues: what the government reform tells us

The three foreseen cases of crisis resolution

Case one: «In case of revocation of confidence in the elected Prime Minister, by means of a reasoned motion, the President of the Republic dissolves the Chambers». Everything is clear here: we go straight back to the polls, and therefore it is unlikely that this motion of no confidence will be presented unless we want the end of the legislature. Case two: «In the event of voluntary resignation of the elected Prime Minister, following parliamentary information, he can propose, within seven days, the dissolution of the Chambers to the President of the Republic, who orders it». The prime minister therefore has the right to request and obtain early dissolution if there is an extra-parliamentary political crisis that causes him to lose the support of a majority party. Case three: «If he does not exercise this faculty and in cases of death, permanent impediment, forfeiture, the President of the Republic may confer, only once during the legislature, the task of forming the Government on the resigning President of the Council or on a other parliamentarian elected in liaison with the Prime Minister”. In the event that the elected prime minister does not want to return to the polls, he therefore has two options: either to try to reappoint himself and perhaps try to change the majority, for example by replacing the party that took away his support with an opposition party, or he can pass the hand to another member of the majority who at that point can no longer be replaced (“only once in the legislature”).

The (non-legislated) case of lack of confidence in a measure

But what happens if the elected representative is defeated in the vote of confidence on a measure? The case simply was not regulated. By the will of the League, to be precise, which evidently wants to reserve the possibility of unseating the elected representative without risking a return to the polls. According to the president of the Balboni commission and according to Minister Casellati, supported by some constitutionalists close to the government, this case falls within that of voluntary resignation and therefore the elected representative might be sent back to the Chambers to verify the existence of the fiduciary relationship. For critics and many other constitutionalists, however, in the case of defeat on the vote of confidence, the resignation is obligatory, not voluntary, and therefore the person elected might not ask for the dissolution of the Chambers and might be replaced. The interpretation of the text is therefore uncertain, and failure to resolve this issue exposes one to the non-trivial risk of a potential conflict between the powers of the State, i.e. the elected Prime Minister and the President of the Republic.

The guarantor role of the President of the Republic….

The other changes concern article 59, with the abolition of senators for life appointed by the President of the Republic (only former presidents of the Republic will be senators for life by right) and articles 88 and 89: on the one hand, the semester is abolished white, i.e. that period of time that coincides with the last six months of the seven-year term of the Head of State in which it is not possible to dissolve the Chambers; on the other hand, the powers of the President of the Republic are strengthened by removing the countersignature from a whole series of acts (the appointment of the Prime Minister, the appointment of the judges of the Constitutional Court, the granting of pardons and the commutation of sentences, the decree calling of elections and referendums, messages to Parliament and the referral of laws to the Chambers). Furthermore, by intervening on article 83, the guarantee role of the President of the Republic is strengthened with the provision that for his election the absolute majority instead of two thirds of the votes of the assembled Parliament takes place following the sixth ballot instead of following the third.

…and his real powers

But is it true, as the government claims, that the powers of the President of the Republic are not affected by the Casellati bill? Formally it is true, but in political substance his role is greatly reduced. As seen by analyzing the new articles 92 and 94, the resolution of political crises has predetermined outcomes in the majority of cases. The Head of State must dissolve the Chambers if the elected prime minister asks him to, thus losing his true political power which is precisely the dissolution. And in the event that the prime minister decides to pass the buck instead of returning to the polls, the stakes for the nomination of the successor prevent those solutions of technical governments or the president that the tenants of the Colle have chosen in recent years. In essence, if this reform of the Constitution had been in force, it would not have been possible to create the broad-based government presided over by Mario Monti in 2011 nor the one presided over by Mario Draghi in 2021, as neither Monti nor Draghi were parliamentarians elected in connection to the prime minister. Likewise, President Sergio Mattarella might not have appointed Giuseppe Conte as prime minister in 2018 to lead the yellow-green government (M5s-Lega), as he is not a parliamentarian.

The problem of system flexibility in the event of external crises

Of course, the last two legislatures have been particularly eventful because the electoral outcomes in both 2013 and 2018 did not produce a certain winner who was capable of forming a majority. With a majoritarian electoral system that produces a certain winner, the role of the President of the Republic would naturally be reduced: he would simply have to take note of the result of the elections, as happened in 2022 with the clear victory of the center-right led by Meloni and even before that with the victories of the centre-right led by Silvio Berlusconi and of the centre-left led by Romano Prodi. The problem, for critics, is that the Casellati bill designs an overly rigid system for exiting government crises, while greater flexibility should be left to deal with any external concomitances such as a pandemic, a serious international crisis or a war.