The chairman says that her committee will likely finish discussing the constitutional council’s ideas in February and told RÚV she does not see it as unlikely that a majority of the committee will be in favour of a referendum.

The Alþingi constitutional and surveillance committee has been working through the constitutional council’s ideas for a new constitution since the autumn and chairman Valgerður Bjarnadóttir says that the work is going well.

The committee has received around 70 written remarks and some 200 requests for the constitutional council’s proposals to be sent unchanged to a referendum. Valgerður says that that idea has been discussed several times by the committee members. She says it is possible the committee will schedule the referendum to go ahead at the same time as this year’s planned presidential election.

“Yes, I don’t find that unlikely, but I cannot judge for others, but I don’t think it unlikely that there will be a majority in favour of that on the committee,” Valgerður said.

The constitutional council’s recommendations are in 114 articles and it is not clear whether voters would be asked for their opinion on all of them at the same time, or if they would be asked about each individually.

If the constitutional referendum is to go ahead with the presidential election at the end of June, Alþingi must pass a bill to authorise the plebiscite before the end of March. The results of the referendum would presumably shape the draft new constitution document; but that document itself will not be put before Alþingi for debate and voting until this autumn at the earliest.

Sigurdardottir says people should vote on the proposed new constitution, which was drafted by a specially convened constitutional council, at the same time they vote in presidential elections next year. The results of the public vote would then be a major influence on the Althingi parliament, which has the final say.

Althingi was opened for its autumn term this Saturday. “The constitution bill will be one of the big issues of this winter’s parliament, which has a duty to take on the matter. I want the bill to go before the new Althingi Constitutional and Supervision Committee and for the committee to discuss it with the constitutional council and respected and trusted experts. Finally I want the bill to go to public consultation alongside the presidential election,” the Prime Minister said. Presidential elections are scheduled for 30th June 2012, Visir.is reports.

On the subject of another proposed referendum, Sigurdardottir said that she does not believe MPs will cancel Iceland’s European Union application, thereby stealing the chance to vote on the final accession treaty from the public. She said it is in everybody’s interest to work towards the most favourable EU accession treaty possible.

(Photos: ACE // IceNews)

The proposed constitution will be put to Althingi as a dossier at the beginning of the month, according to a memorandum released by the President of Althingi, Asta Ragnheidur Johannesdottir yesterday.

The parliamentary president believes it would not be a good idea to debate the proposed constitution in the frenzied September meetings; as the fast pace of business would not allow for adequate discussion. The new parliamentary term officially starts on the 1st October; at which time unfinished business from the last year is put aside and parliament begins again afresh.

According to Visir.is, the Althingi Presidium (the parliamentary president’s committee) believes that the public should be consulted throughout the constitution’s progress through Althingi with advertisements in the media calling for public comments; as was done when the constitution was ammended in 1994-95.

The committee also recommends that relevant individuals be called to meetings; including political scientists and members of the Constitutional Council and its predecessor, the Constitutional Assembly. All Members of Althingi should also be free to express their opinions on record if they please.

Each member of the council was invited to say a few words about how important they feel the new constitution is. Following that, the chairperson of the council, Salvor Nordal, handed the document over to Asta Ragnheidur Johannesdottir, the president of Althingi (Iceland’s national parliament).

The council members did a good job of stating the importance of their work. Thorvaldur Gylfason, for example, said that the new constitution (which will be put before Althingi as a bill for approval) is the biggest victory in the democratic history of Iceland. The constitution was passed with 25 votes against 0.

Both Salvor Nordal and Asta Ragnheidur Johannesdottir said that a detailed and long-running discussion will likely ensue in all areas of society, and not just in parliament. A constitutional parliamentary committee has now been established to deal with the new constitution and its progress through parliament.

It is the wish of the Constitutional Council that the new constitution be accepted in whole by Althingi and that it will replace the current, outdated constitution. In reality Althingi can make changes to the new document and could even reject it outright — although that seems unlikely.

The draft will be discussed by committees and will likely take some changes before being sent to Althingi as a bill in the coming days. It is thought that the draft bill to parliament will be presented to the president of Althingi on the 29th July.

Among the notable points in the proposed new constitution are that the government would be legally bound to provide unhindered internet access to the public — but that the Lutheran church is the National Church of Iceland is not to be found in the document, Visir.is reported.

The President of the Republic would not be permitted to sit more than three terms, the voices of 15 percent of the electorate would be able to put bills to Althingi and also force parliamentary issues to a referendum.

The number of government ministers would be capped at ten and ministers would be forced to give up their Althingi seats.

Iceland’s natural resources would be designated public property and no private organisation or individual would be permitted to own them or rights connected to them.

The draft articles have been published on the constitutional council’s website for all to see.

According to Rasmussen the draft of a new Faroese constitution, which is being debated by the parliament in Torshavn, contains material which contravenes the Danish constitution. He added that in order to keep the new constitution on track the Faroe Islands would need to formally declare their intention to gain full independence from Denmark. If the islands do not, they will simply have to withdraw the draft constitution.

The Ministry of Justice in Copenhagen has come to the conclusion that many clauses in the proposed constitution are incompatible with corresponding clauses in the Danish document. Among the controversial clauses is one that calls for all control over the Faroe Islands be put into Faroese hands.

Lars Lokke Rasmussen has now sent the Faroese premier Kaj Leo Holm Johannesen a pithily-worded letter where he says the Faroe Islanders are standing at the crossroads of two hard choices. The home-rule colony must either withdraw its draft constitution, or break all ties with Denmark. If the Faroe Islands decide they want total independence, Denmark would not stand in their way, the Prime Minister says. He added, by way of further explanation, that the Faroes cannot maintain their status within the Kingdom of Denmark at the same time as creating their own constitution which is practically a declaration of independence, in all but name — and which contradicts the Danish constitution.

In a meeting between the two leaders a week ago, the Faroese Logmadur indicated to Rasmussen that the Faroes Islands are not pushing for immediate independence and will likely withdraw their draft constitution. One opposition party supported Johannesen’s stance, while another accused Denmark of colonial bully tactics, RUV reported.

The resolution was passed with 31 votes for, 21 against and seven no-votes, Visir.is reports.

Instead of the 25-member constitutional parliament the public voted on last year, parliament will now appoint the same 25 people who were elected on to a constitutional council. The election was voided on technical grounds and there was no suggestion that the 25 people elected did not represent the will of the people.

The council will have a non-binding consultative role and will present parliament with recommendations on how to change the national constitution for the better.

Any of the 25 who do not want to sit on the council will be replaced by the person who received the next-highest number of public votes.

Althingi passed the resolution despite opposition from the Independence Party and reservations from several government MPs, including Interior Minister Ogmundur Jonasson.

The resolution was put forth by Alfheidur Ingadottir, Birgitta Jonsdottir and Valgerdur Bjarnadottir.

The committee decided that appointing the 25 members to a constitutional council would be the cheapest and simplest way to solve the problem caused when the Supreme Court of Iceland decided that the election result was invalid due to technical irregularities. There is no suspicion that the election was in any way unfair or unrepresentative; but the court decided that there had been an unacceptable number of irregularities for the result to stand.

Ogmundur Jonasson, Minister of Internal Affairs, said today that he disagrees wit the committee. He believes that appointing the 25 people to do very nearly the same job as they were elected to do would be to stretch the supreme court ruling too far.

Althingi will debate the committee’s findings and will likely accept them. If, however, MPs vote to hold the election again, it is not yet known whether or not that election would go ahead at the same time as the Icesave referendum which has been pencilled in for 9th April.

The parliamentary committee which is deciding what the government’s next step should be in this matter, is expected to provide its recommendations later today.

Gisli Trygvason, one of the 25 people elected to the constitutional assembly, last week made a formal request for the Supreme Court of Iceland to re-examine its decision to void the election on technical grounds.

Trygvason claimed that the court’s decision had been partly based on incorrect information; but yesterday’s reply says that no information or technical or legal points have yet come to light that would compel the court to reconsider.

By coincidence, today is not only the day the parliamentary committee is due to present its recommendation; it is also the day the constitutional assembly was supposed to begin — had the election been allowed to stand.

According to RUV, the committee is only looking seriously at three possibilities: A re-run of the election with all of the same candidates as before, an entirely new election, or for parliament to vote directly for the constitutional assembly (a situation which would most likely lead to the same 25 people being elected as were elected in the public vote).

The plaintiffs claim that the decision was an administrative one and not a proper legal judgement, RUV reports.

Under Icelandic law, if a court judgement is partly based on incomplete or wrong information, it should be reinvestigated. The group claims that the Supreme Court’s decision was based on incomplete information as the court did not heed its own research findings in making sure the electoral deficiencies it identified actually made any difference. Among the deficiencies was the fact that ballots were numbered, leading the court to rule that votes could have been traced to voters. The plaintiffs argue that the court did not go into whether this did happen or whether it would have been easy or even practically possible outside the realm of theory.

At the same time, the leaders of the main political parties have been meeting over the issue to discuss the best course of action. They plan to meet the 25 elected committee members later this week.