The courts spend 3.5 billion reais to “buy” part of the 60 days of vacation of magistrates

Magistrates, magistrates and ministers are entitled to 2 months of rest; the sale is incorporated into the paycheck outside the constitutional ceiling

RIO – The Brazilian courts spent at least BRL 3.5 billion over the past six years to buy holidays for judges, judges and ministers. Some magistrates waive the 60-day rest period, a privilege of the category, to enhance its salary monthly. The sum of the fixed income from the sale of vacations exceeds the constitutional ceiling of R$ 41.6 thousand.

The privilege of wearing the toga has recently been criticized by minister Gilmar Mendes, dean of the Federal Court of Justice (STF). A survey of Stadiumbased on the data available at the National Council of Justice (CNJ), from September 2017 to May 2023, points out that the judicial paid billions to State, Federal, Labor, Electoral and Superior Court judges (STJ, TST, STM and TSE) and that selling vacations has become another trinket to raise wages.

It’s an expense for public safes which grows every year. In the first five months of 2023 alone, 8,360 payments were made, for a total of 307 million reais. In 2022 the expenditure was BRL 772 million. In the previous year, the Brazilian judiciary paid 677 million reais in compensation for unfulfilled holidays, according to data from the CNJ.

A Constitution limit your monthly earnings civil service to the salary of a minister of the STF (today at R$ 41,650.92). However, the magistrates receive a series of trinkets that increase their salaries at the end of the month. Until 2024, due to the 18% readjustment approved by Congress for members of the Supreme Court, the salary will reach R $ 46,366.19. As ministers’ salaries serve as a benchmark for members of other courts, judges and judges, the increase will have a cascading effect on judiciary pay across the country.

Brazil currently has around 18,000 magistrates, again according to the CNJ. The number of holiday payments sold by category grew 74% in four years. In 2018, 28,899 compensation funds were released. Last year, the volume reached 46,894. The numbers are higher than the total number of judges because there are retroactive payments or amounts paid over more than a month.

The two months of holidays are foreseen in Organic law of the judiciary (Loman), effective since 1979. Gilmar’s criticisms were a reaction to what he understood as an attempt by the Brazilian Magistrates’ Association (AMB) to delay the start of the warrant judge’s trial.

“If the Amb wants to continue the debates on the speed of the process, in general, accept the month’s vacation,” Gilmar said in the plenary session of the Court on May 24. “The two-month vacation ends,” he said.

Part of the rest days can be sold and works in practice as additional income. One of the arguments judges use to seek compensation is the workload in the courts.

Judges and prosecutors rebel at the end of the 2 month holiday

Privilege has entered the radar of parliamentarians and civil society. Deputies have intended to insert the end of the two months of holidays for members of the Judiciary and the Public Prosecutor in the Proposal to Amend the Constitution 32 (PEC-32), of 2020, which deals with the administrative reform of functionalism.

‘Finish the two months of vacation’, suggests Gilmar to the judges

The High Minister publicly questioned the privilege of the gown during the STF session; clock https://t.co/jgdRP2G05v pic.twitter.com/vO3CmLlsn8

– Stadium? (@estadao) May 24, 2023

Members of parliament and the judiciary rioted at the end of the benefit. Nine associations that make up the Frente Associativa da Magistratura e do Ministério Público (Frentas) have mobilized against the inclusion of categories in the reform.

According to career representatives, the measure violates the separation of powers. Frentas tries to argue that the 60-day vacation does not consist of “privileges” and is essential for the performance of the functions of judges and prosecutors. “It is inadmissible that the constitutional amendments serve as an instrument for the Legislator to interfere in matters subject to the initiative of other Powers, under penalty of manifest violation of the stony clause of the separation of Powers,” the association said in a statement.

The secretary general of the NGO Contas Abertas, Gil Castello Branco, estimates that the project to eliminate super salaries for magistrates is progressing “at a turtle’s pace”. “The privileges of the Judiciary are practically untouchable. Therefore, the administrative reforms considered do not affect the Three Powers and the burden falls, as a rule, on the employees of the Executive,” she said.

“These historic privileges are legal, but they are unjust and immoral. Especially since they only benefit one caste. But the class associations are fighting to ensure that these benefits do not go extinct. the leaders of the Judiciary”, stated Castello Branco.

Holidays are defended in the legal environment

Despite the criticisms, there are those who argue that legal careers benefit. The 60-day vacation is defended, for example, by the retired minister of the STF Marcus Aurelius Mello and by the Attorney General of the Republic, Augustus Aras.

“Usually a month (from the judges holiday) is dedicated to rearguard work, i.e. to infrastructural work in the preparation of opinions, reports and votes”, said Marco Aurélio, in a hearing with representatives of the Public Prosecutor.

For him, the benefit is justified because ministers, judges and other legal practitioners use part of their holidays for tasks for which, in their daily work in the courts, they no longer have time.

Source: Terra

Rose

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