Can a court, by way of interim relief (an order, not a judgment), require a politician to publish the content of a correction in a strictly specified form, within a specific eight-hour time limit, and without any possibility of limiting the reach of the post; and can the court itself determine the wording of the statement to be published by the losing party in a dispute concerning infringement of personal rights?
The source database does not contain the direct text of the provision, so I rely on the general principle arising from Article 80(1) of the Act of 26 January 1984, the Press Law, and from Articles 13¹⁴ and 23-24 of the Civil Code in conjunction with Article 486¹ of the Code of Civil Procedure: a person whose personal right (here: reputation and credibility) has been infringed by the dissemination of false information may seek cessation of the infringement and a correction, and a court granting interim relief may order specific conduct even before the case is finally determined, provided the claim is neither unfounded nor obvious. The key practical rule from this report is that the court did not stop at prohibiting further dissemination, but imposed a positive obligation (publication on Facebook and X within eight hours of the order becoming final) and itself prescribed the wording of the statement, including an admission that “I had no basis for presenting such a claim as fact”. This goes beyond an ordinary correction of factual content and comes close to compelling an acknowledgment that the assertion was groundless.
The argument that, in personal-rights cases, interim relief may include not only cessation but also an obligation to publish court-formulated content, subject to a time limit (eight hours) and a prohibition on comments or on hiding the post algorithmically or manually, has become materially stronger. Electoral committees and candidates in local-government campaigns must therefore take into account that a single statement made at a campaign meeting may result in an immediate court-drafted statement being published on their own social-media profiles. The practical risk is that publishing the correction with an added personal comment, explanation, or restriction on the post’s visibility would breach the order and could be treated as non-compliance, with all the attendant enforcement consequences.
The second conclusion from the same report, however, cuts both ways: the court dismissed the requests for an apology, a PLN 10,000 payment to a foundation, and correction of a statement made on Polsat News. This shows that protection of personal rights in an election campaign is calibrated to the actual scope of the infringement: a claimant cannot demand the “full package” (correction + apology + monetary payment) where the infringement concerned a specific, verifiable factual proposition (here: a councillor’s voting attendance), rather than a general injury to reputation.
What legal effects does obtaining the status of a university-type institution within the meaning of the Law on Higher Education and Science have for a non-public higher education institution, in particular as regards the authority to confer academic degrees and autonomy in establishing fields of study.
The sources provided do not contain the direct text of the relevant provision, so I rely on the general principle arising from the Act of 20 July 2018 — the Law on Higher Education and Science: the status of a university-type institution (Article 14 of that Act) is granted to an institution that satisfies the statutory conditions concerning the number of disciplines conducted and the scientific categories awarded in the evaluation. That status is a condition for conducting independent proceedings for the award of doctoral and post-doctoral habilitation degrees and for exercising expanded curricular autonomy. Under this rule, it is the scientific categories resulting from the evaluation of research activity (conducted by the ministry), and not a decision of the institution itself, that determine the scope of its powers — as confirmed in the message by the indication of four disciplines with category A and three with category B+.
The sources provided contain no case-law material concerning this issue, so this section cannot be completed without the risk of citing a non-existent judgment.
The key practical point is that the scope of the institution’s powers is “discipline-dependent”: WSEI University may confer doctoral and post-doctoral habilitation degrees and create new fields of study without ministerial consent only in the disciplines in which it has obtained scientific categories (A and B+), and not across its entire educational profile. Accordingly, fields such as nursing or physiotherapy, which attract the greatest interest from applicants, require a separate assessment as to whether they fall within health sciences disciplines holding category B+. For practitioners, this means that when assessing education contracts, employment of academic staff (the institution has 260 persons employed under employment contracts and approximately 250 under civil-law contracts, which gives rise to the typical higher-education-sector risk of reclassification of B2B cooperation as employment), and planning doctoral recruitment, it is necessary to verify whether the relevant discipline is in fact covered by the awarded categorisation, because outside that scope the institution has neither independent habilitation powers nor full curricular autonomy.
Whether the proposed increase in excise duty rates from 2027 will be enacted within the statutory timeframe required for it to enter into force on 1 January 2027, and whether the declared allocation of part of the revenue to the National Health Fund has a genuine basis in the draft legislation or is merely a budgetary declaration.
The sources do not contain the direct text of the provision, so the analysis is based on the general principle of tax law expressed in Article 84 of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland and on the rules governing excise duty set out in the Excise Duty Act and EU directives harmonising excise structures, including in relation to ethyl alcohol, beer, wine and fermented beverages. The principle of tax legality means that a tax rate may be changed only by statute, and its entry into force requires compliance with vacatio legis requirements. In fiscal practice, it is accepted that changes to indirect tax rates should be enacted sufficiently in advance of the beginning of the tax year to allow taxpayers, including producers and importers, to adjust pricing calculations and tax declarations.
The referral of the bill to the Public Finance Committee in October 2026 means that a relatively short period remains for the statute to be enacted before the planned entry into force of the changes in 2027.
The sources provided contain no case law on this specific issue, so it is not possible to identify a settled judicial line. It is worth noting only that disputes concerning the compatibility of excise duty increases with constitutional tax principles, especially the prohibition on retroactivity and the principle of legitimate expectations, have appeared in the case law of the Constitutional Tribunal in other tax contexts, but not in relation to these specific rates.
The argument raised in the Sejm debate by MP Sachajko, namely that out of an estimated PLN 1.8 billion in additional VAT and excise revenue only PLN 1.4 billion would go to the National Health Fund, and that from 2029 support for the Fund would depend on actual receipts, points to a key legislative risk: a declaration that revenue will be allocated to healthcare is not the same as a permanent statutory earmarking of those revenues. Excise receipts flow into the state budget as general revenue, and transfers to the National Health Fund occur only under separate arrangements, namely the Act on Healthcare Services Financed from Public Funds and the Budget Act. In practice, alcohol industry operators should monitor the final wording of the rates, especially for cider and perry, where the increase is contested, and should price in the 2027 cost risk, bearing in mind that the final rates may differ from those presented by Deputy Minister Neneman, including the increase in ethyl alcohol from PLN 8,811 to PLN 10,109 per hectolitre of 100% alcohol.
The argument that the increase pursues a “health objective” may also be relevant to the assessment of proportionality if the bill were to come before the Constitutional Tribunal.
Documents producing procedural effects are subject to the regime under Articles 131 and 132, which the amendment does not affect; email may be used only for minor matters that do not produce procedural effects.
The Act will now be submitted to the Senate, and its entry into force is planned 14 days after publication in the Journal of Laws.
Witnesses and injured parties in criminal proceedings may soon expect courts to contact them by email or telephone, and their identifying data to be submitted to the court even before their first examination. On 8 October 2026, the Sejm adopted an amendment to the Code of Criminal Procedure and the Act on Electronic Delivery, providing for broader use of email and telephone in communications between procedural authorities and witnesses, and abolishing provisions on fax transmission. The legal issue concerns the manner of service and notification in criminal proceedings, governed by the provisions of the Code of Criminal Procedure, in particular Articles 131, 132 § 3, 337^a and 338 §§ 4-5, in conjunction with the Act of 18 November 2020 on Electronic Delivery (Journal of Laws of 2026, item 3).
The consolidated text of the Code of Criminal Procedure of 27 March 2026 already provides that summonses, notices and other documents are served at the electronic delivery address entered in the electronic address database (Article 131 § 1 in conjunction with Article 2 point 1 of the Act on Electronic Delivery), while service on a non-public entity requires that entity’s consent given in the relevant proceedings. The amendment extends this model to contact with witnesses: before the first examination, the court will obtain the witness’s email address and telephone number together with their PESEL number and identity document details. Data protection is ensured by a mechanism known from the Act of 19 July 2019: data of injured parties and witnesses (place of residence, telephone number, email address) are kept in an address annex to the case file, for the knowledge only of the authority conducting the proceedings, while copies preventing access to such data are included in the case file. The explanatory memorandum to the amendment emphasises that the PESEL number and identity document details will not be included in the examination record made available to the parties. The key distinction invoked by Deputy Minister Myrcha is that documents producing procedural effects remain subject to the regime under Articles 131 and 132, which the amendment does not affect; email may be used only for minor matters that do not produce procedural effects. By comparison, in civil proceedings electronic service is deemed effective at the time indicated in the acknowledgement of receipt, and, in the absence of such acknowledgement, upon expiry of 14 days from placing the document in the ICT system; this was precisely the risk model (spam filters) raised by deputies during the debate. The procedure for serving documents in electronic form in criminal proceedings is also regulated by the Regulation of the Minister of Justice of 12 March 2024, issued pursuant to Article 133a § 5 of the Code of Criminal Procedure.
For witnesses and injured parties, several elements are of practical significance: - the court will obtain their email address and telephone number before the first examination, which will facilitate changes of dates and contact without postal correspondence;
Article 165 § 1 of the Criminal Code penalises the manufacture, accumulation, possession or use of an explosive substance without the required authorisation with imprisonment from 6 months to 8 years.
Article 64 of the Act on Explosive Materials requires forfeiture of explosive materials, ammunition and objects used or intended to be used to commit the offence, even if they are not owned by the perpetrator.
The 19-year-old from Ostrołęka will primarily answer for offences against public safety, not merely for inciting panic or spreading alarm, although the prosecutor’s appeal concerning “Bloody Friday” already relates to a different plane: liability for disseminating false alarms. The key point is that the charges include attempted murder of multiple persons using an explosive material and with a motive deserving particular condemnation, which opens the way to the highest statutory penalty: life imprisonment. The legal issue will be the classification of the act as causing an explosion of explosive materials, as referred to in Article 163 § 1 point 3 of the Criminal Code, and the unlawful manufacture and use of an explosive substance under Article 165 § 1 of the Criminal Code. The preparation of the device itself will be assessed separately, because independently accumulating a substance capable of endangering the lives of many persons constitutes a separate offence, irrespective of whether a detonation occurred.
The charge under Article 163 § 1 of the Criminal Code covers causing an event endangering the life or health of many persons in the form of an explosion of explosive materials: there were eleven persons in the room, so the “many persons” condition is satisfied, and the additional charge of attempted murder leads to cumulative legal classification. In parallel, provisions of the Act on Explosive Materials may apply: Article 63a of that Act provides for a penalty of 6 months to 8 years for acquiring, storing or using explosive materials without a permit. Preventive measures: the prosecutor’s office has applied to the court for three months’ pre-trial detention, with the grounds including, among other things, the severe penalty faced and the risk of obstruction of justice; the penitentiary context is confirmed by Article 88a of the Executive Penal Code, which includes among convicted persons posing a serious social threat perpetrators of offences committed using explosive materials. The distinction in legal classification is illustrated by comparison with the Petty Offences Code: Article 83 § 1 of the Petty Offences Code, concerning negligent handling of explosive materials and punishable by detention, a fine or a reprimand, applies only to unintentional acts of considerably lower harmfulness, and therefore is not applicable in this case. The wording of the charge referring to a motive deserving particular condemnation may also trigger higher minimum penalties, while the suspect’s independent preparation of the device for now excludes liability of accomplices.
Realistic scenarios for the suspect include conviction for attempted murder of multiple persons carrying a sentence of 25 years’ imprisonment or life imprisonment, or alternatively lesser classifications under Articles 163 and 165 of the Criminal Code, always with forfeiture of the objects connected with the offence. The 23 injured parties will acquire the procedural status of victims, with the right to take initiative in the proceedings, and, in the event of conviction, the possibility of pursuing civil claims within the criminal case. For pupils and parents spreading rumours about “Bloody Friday,” the prosecutor’s appeal has practical significance: unverified reports may give rise to separate liability, while the services indicate that they are checking specific signals and distinguishing them from anonymous rumours. The next investigative steps follow from the reported findings: one should expect a court decision on the application for three months’ pre-trial detention and the results of examinations of the seized substances, which will determine the final legal classification of the device.