Minority veto on entrenched rights

Entrenched rights and minority veto

Purpose

Majorities change, and a temporary majority can remove rights that minorities depend on. This rule puts a short list of rights beyond the reach of ordinary decisions and, from version 1.1, gives organised minorities a brake on decisions that threaten them. Because vetoes can also paralyse a polity (the liberum veto of the Polish-Lithuanian Sejm, which let a single deputy end a session, is the classic warning), the brake is narrow, time-limited and subject to independent review.

Article 1. Entrenched rights

The following rights are entrenched:

1. the right to leave the polity, and to take one's personal property and entitlements;
2. equal voting rights for all full members;
3. freedom of expression, belief and peaceful assembly;
4. the right to a fair hearing and an appeal before any sanction;
5. equal treatment regardless of sex, ethnicity, religion, language, disability or sexual orientation;
6. the right to use one's own language in dealings with the polity, where the charter recognises it as a community language;
7. this Article and Article 2.

Article 2. Changing entrenched rights

1. An entrenched right may be amended only to extend it, or if a proposal is approved by three quarters of the assembly in two votes separated by an ordinary election, and then by a referendum.
2. Any rule or decision that conflicts with an entrenched right is void to the extent of the conflict. Any member may ask the independent review body to declare it so.

Article 3. Guardian of entrenched rights

1. The independent review body decides whether a rule or decision conflicts with an entrenched right. Any member, any body of the polity and any recognised community may apply to it.
2. Before the assembly votes on a proposal, one fifth of its members may ask the review body for an opinion on whether the proposal conflicts with an entrenched right. The vote is postponed until the opinion is given, for no more than 30 days.
3. The review body gives written reasons and publishes its decisions. It may declare a rule void, or interpret it in a way that is compatible with the entrenched rights.
4. Members of the review body serve a single term of nine years and cannot be removed because of the content of their decisions.

Article 4. Minority alarm procedure

1. A recognised community (a linguistic, religious or territorial group listed in the schedule) may invoke the alarm procedure against a decision it considers a serious threat to its rights or identity. Invocation requires the support of at least three quarters of the assembly members elected by or belonging to that community, or a petition of 20% of its members.
2. Invocation suspends the decision for 60 days.
3. During the suspension a joint committee with equal numbers from the community and the rest of the assembly, assisted by a mediator, seeks an amended text.
4. At the end of the suspension the assembly votes again. The decision then requires, in addition to the ordinary majority, a majority of the members belonging to the community concerned (concurrent majority).

Article 5. Limits on the veto

1. The alarm procedure may be invoked only against decisions that concern the subjects listed in Article 1 or the community's language, education, religious institutions or land held in common. The independent review body decides within 14 days whether an invocation falls within this scope; an invocation outside it is void.
2. No individual member, and no group smaller than the thresholds in Article 4(1), can block any decision.
3. Each community may invoke the procedure no more than three times in a year.
4. The budget may not be blocked as a whole. If a dispute concerns a budget item, the previous year's allocation for that item continues while the procedure runs.
5. If the concurrent majority is not reached, the question goes to binding arbitration by a panel of three, one member appointed by the community, one by the assembly and a chair by the two. The panel may approve, reject or amend the decision, applying the entrenched rights.