In the past two years, courts have increasingly held that the Act on Cemeteries and Burial of the Deceased permits only charges for the burial of human remains and for reserving a grave against reuse for a further 20 years.
Municipalities that finance municipal cemeteries from a broader range of charges than solely the burial fee and the fee for extending the right of burial risk losing part of their revenue as administrative courts declare pricing resolutions invalid. The municipal council adopts the price list as an act of local law, and in the past two years courts have increasingly held that the Act on Cemeteries and Burial of the Deceased (of 31 January 1959, consolidated text announced by notice of the Marshal of the Sejm of 7 November 2025) permits only charges for the burial of human remains and for reserving a grave against reuse for a further 20 years. The Ministry of the Interior and Administration is seeking a solution in Article 4(1)(2) of the Municipal Economy Act, which, in the Ministry’s view, gives municipal councils competence to set prices and charges for municipal public-utility services and for the use of municipal facilities and equipment.
Under Article 15(1) of the Act on Cemeteries and Burial of the Deceased (cited in source [15]), the maintenance and management of municipal cemeteries are among a municipality’s own tasks, while Article 4 of that Act requires municipal cemeteries, as a rule, to be established within the territory of each municipality. Article 5(1) and (2) of the Cemeteries Act (source [16]) imposes obligations on municipalities regarding the technical and sanitary condition of cemeteries, the costs of which require own-source revenue. The courts limit the catalogue of charges to two. By its draft, the Ministry of the Interior and Administration seeks to add to the Cemeteries Act a provision determining that charges for municipal services connected with cemeteries and for the use of cemetery infrastructure are to be set on the basis of the Municipal Economy Act. Following the model of the analogous structure for waste-management charges under Articles 6k and 6l of the Act on Maintaining Cleanliness and Order in Municipalities (sources [12], [17]) — under which the municipal council, by resolution constituting an act of local law, determines the rates and the deadline, frequency and procedure for paying charges — the cemetery resolution will remain an act of local law subject to judicial review.
Until the amendment enters into force, municipalities remain in a risk zone: courts may declare pricing resolutions invalid insofar as they concern charges not covered by the two grounds provided for in the Cemeteries Act, which means reimbursement of charges collected and the loss of a funding source for maintaining greenery, paths, lighting and waste removal. For cemetery users, the effect may be twofold: after a price list is annulled, unpaid charges collected without a legal basis are refundable, while maintenance costs may at the same time be shifted to other municipal sources. Once the provision referring to the Municipal Economy Act enters into force, the rates will remain a decision for each municipal council; the Act will not introduce uniform rates nationwide.
Correction. The article states imprecisely that “therapies under drug programmes are free of charge for patients” without any qualification. In fact, free provision is not unconditional: under Article 42b of the Act on healthcare services financed from public funds, in the consolidated text announced by the notice of the Marshal of the Sejm of 26 September 2025, the patient must be qualified for the relevant drug programme by the healthcare provider, and reimbursement of the costs of medicines used in programmes under Article 42c applies only to medicines prescribed in accordance with indications confirmed in the medical documentation and corresponding to the indications covered by reimbursement in the list under Article 37(1) of the Reimbursement Act. More precisely, the article should therefore have stated that free provision under a drug programme is available to a patient who has been qualified for the programme and covers medicines used for indications consistent with the list. A patient who is outside the qualification criteria or outside the listed indications does not benefit from free provision, even if formally “in the programme”.
Under Article 6(2), a medicine in the pharmacy category is dispensed to the beneficiary free of charge, for a flat-rate payment, or for a payment equal to 30% or 50% of the financing limit, up to the amount of that limit and with a surcharge equal to the difference between the retail price and the limit.
A medicine is included in reimbursement by way of an administrative decision of the minister competent for health matters (Article 11(1)), and an application may be submitted only by the applicant pursuant to Article 24(1), indicating, among other things, the reimbursement availability category, payment level and risk-sharing instruments (Article 25 point 6).
For the 24 million Poles who purchased at least one reimbursed medicine in 2025, the announcement by the Ministry of Health means a real prospect of restructuring the rules on pharmacy co-payment, but only within the horizon of the State Pharmaceutical Policy strategy for 2027-2032, not under the law currently in force. The Ministry signals a move away from a model in which reimbursement applies from the first purchased package, towards a system based on a patient's cumulative expenditure, with thresholds depending, among other things, on the patient's financial situation. The precise legal issue therefore concerns the future structure of reimbursement availability categories and payment levels, which are currently regulated by the Act of 12 May 2011 on the Reimbursement of Medicines, Foodstuffs Intended for Particular Nutritional Uses and Medical Devices (consolidated text announced by notice of the Marshal of the Sejm of 20 February 2026, item 253). Articles 6(1) and 6(2), Articles 10-11, and Articles 24-25 of that Act are key. Until an amendment is enacted, none of the announced changes will have legal effect.
The current system is based on Article 6(1) of the Reimbursement Act, which establishes reimbursement availability categories: a medicine available on prescription in a pharmacy (point 1), a medicine under a drug programme (point 2), a medicine used in chemotherapy (point 3), and a medicine used as part of other guaranteed healthcare services (point 4).
The proposed threshold-based model has no basis in any of the identified source provisions and would require amendment of Article 6 and the related provisions on the reimbursement list (Article 37(1)). The accumulation mechanism would have to be added to the Act as a separate norm. The beneficiary's entitlement to pharmacy reimbursement also follows from Article 43a of the Act on Healthcare Services Financed from Public Funds (consolidated text of 26 September 2025), which refers to the rules set out in the Reimbursement Act. The sources contain no case law concerning threshold-based co-payment models, so no precedent can be cited. For pharmacies, Article 43(1)(6) of the Reimbursement Act is also relevant (as worded in the Act of 17 August 2023): reimbursement must be returned with statutory interest within 14 days of a demand where a prescription is found to have been filled in breach of the regulations.
The most realistic scenario is the publication of the full assumptions of the State Pharmaceutical Policy 2027-2032, followed by legislative work on an amendment to the Reimbursement Act. The practical significance of the announcement varies:
Two matters should be monitored: the content of the adopted State Pharmaceutical Policy 2027-2032 strategy and the appearance of a draft amendment to the Reimbursement Act in the list of legislative work. Only a draft bill containing the specific wording of provisions on payment thresholds will determine whether the announcement becomes a legal norm.
Correction. The article suggests that the Constitution “directly prohibits the use of preventive censorship” without exception, whereas that prohibition has the character of a principle subject to statutory exceptions. The Martial Law Act, Article 20, provides that preventive censorship of the means of social communication may be introduced during martial law, confirming that Article 14 of the Constitution is not an absolute prohibition, but rather a prohibition absent express statutory authorisation under normal conditions. Secondly, the claim that the statute “enables administrative censorship” without any judicial safeguards is incomplete: since, in the analogous model under the Anti-Terrorist Activities Act, Article 2, blocking is decided by the Regional Court in Warsaw upon an application supported by substantiating material, a fair formulation requires identifying at what stage of the new procedure the decision is made and whether judicial review exists. Wielomski himself acknowledges that an appeal to a court is available, albeit that it “will take years”. The article should also separate political assessment from normative assessment: the disputed issue is not “censorship or not”, but whether ex ante control exercised by an administrative authority rather than a court satisfies the proportionality test under Article 31(3) of the Constitution when interfering with Article 54.
The Act of 17 August 2023 amending the Criminal Code (Article 5, amending Article 32c of the Criminal Code) permits access blocking only upon a written request by the Head of the Internal Security Agency submitted after obtaining the written consent of the Prosecutor General, and only in relation to data connected with an event of a terrorist nature or making it plausible that an espionage offence has been committed.
Thursday’s decision by the Sejm (242 votes in favour, 61 against, 136 abstentions) means that the fate of this regulation now moves to the Presidential Palace, where in January 2026 the first version of the bill was already rejected by Karol Nawrocki’s veto.
Operators of internet portals, channels on video platforms, and providers of electronic communications services face the prospect of administrative restrictions on access to content without a court judgment, unless the President vetoes the Act for a second time. Thursday’s decision by the Sejm (242 votes in favour, 61 against, 136 abstentions) means that the fate of this regulation now moves to the Presidential Palace, where in January 2026 the first version of the bill, amending the implementation of the EU Digital Services Act, was already rejected by Karol Nawrocki’s veto. The legal issue comes down to whether the blocking of “illegal content” and “hate speech” may be entrusted to administrative authorities (UKE, KRRiT) at the request of so-called trusted flaggers, or whether it requires a prior court order. Similarly, the Act of 18 October 2024 amending the Act on Anti-Terrorist Activities (Article 2) requires that a request for removal or blocking of access be submitted together with supporting materials, and the order is issued by the Regional Court in Warsaw.
In light of these provisions, the model described in the report — an administrative authority’s decision issued without a court judgment, at the request of entities financed from tax revenues — departs from existing arrangements, under which blocking is a preventive and law-enforcement measure, limited to the most serious offences and subject to review by a court or the Prosecutor General. If the new Act entrusts decisions to the President of UKE, the proceedings would be conducted under the Code of Administrative Procedure (consolidated text of 7 November 2025, Article 31), which governs individual matters resolved by administrative decisions and the imposition of administrative monetary penalties. A model of an administrative decision restricting access to an online interface can be seen in the Act of 7 November 2025 on supervision over the general safety of information society products (Article 53): the decision must include the name of the economic operator, detailed data identifying the online interface, the content of the order, the deadline for compliance, and the deadline for submitting information on compliance, while the President of the Office, when setting deadlines, takes into account the need to protect consumers’ health or life. The Electronic Communications Law of 12 July 2024 (including Article 281 and Section IX on monetary penalties) shows that the President of UKE has instruments of control and sanction over entities in the sector, which, when combined with new blocking powers, would create dual pressure on providers. The constitutional prohibition on preventive censorship has an exceptional counterpart in statutory sources: the Act on Martial Law (consolidated text of 10 April 2025, Article 21) allows censorship and content control, the seizure of publications and telecommunications correspondence, and the emission of signals preventing broadcasting, but only during martial law and through censorship authorities in the form of voivodes. The sources contain no case law concerning a comparable situation.
The nearest and decisive step is the President’s decision: either to sign the Act or to veto it, as in January 2026; without that decision, the provisions will not enter into force. If the Act is signed, the practical risks for publishers and platforms will include an administrative decision restricting access issued without a court judgment, subject to compliance within a short period set by the President of the Office, and monetary penalties imposed through administrative procedure. For providers of electronic communications services, this is compounded by the obligation to technically implement blocking measures under UKE supervision; for “trusted flaggers”, it creates the power to initiate proceedings and public funding from tax revenues. If the President vetoes the Act again, the Sejm (242 votes in favour of adoption) may lack the qualified majority required to override the veto; the sources do not permit determining whether the coalition will reach the required three-fifths majority.
Under Article 599 § 2 of the Civil Code, as amended by the 1971 Act, an unconditional sale is invalid where a statutory right of pre-emption is vested in the lessee of agricultural real estate.
An intra-family transfer of a field, whether by sale to a son or by gift to a daughter, does not terminate an existing lease over that land; the lessee retains the right to use the land, and the new owner steps into the position of the lessor. The content and form of the lease agreement are decisive: they determine whether the acquirer may terminate it and whether, in the case of a sale, the lessee’s statutory right of pre-emption is triggered. The legal issue is governed by the Civil Code and the Act of 11 April 2003 on the Shaping of the Agricultural System, whose provisions on the disposal of agricultural real estate also apply to other acts transferring ownership, as confirmed by individual interpretation 0113-KDIPT2-3.4011.387.2026.2.KKA, according to which “disposal” covers all legal acts resulting in the transfer of ownership.
The acquisition of real estate by gift or sale transfers ownership pursuant to Article 155 § 1 of the Civil Code and, together with the real estate, the lease relationship: the new owner becomes a party to the agreement on the lessor’s side, which is confirmed by the analogous construction in Article 39(6) of the Act on the Management of Agricultural Real Estate of the State Treasury. The acquirer may, however, terminate the lease under the rules governing leases, subject to the statutory notice period; this is not possible where the agreement was concluded for a fixed term, in writing, with a certified date, and the land was delivered to the lessee. An analogous exception is confirmed by Article 1002 of the Code of Civil Procedure: upon adjudication of ownership, a fixed-term agreement exceeding two years may be terminated unless it was concluded in writing with a certified date and the thing was delivered. In the case of the sale of agricultural real estate, the lessee has a statutory right of pre-emption if the lease has in fact lasted for at least three years (Article 29(1) of the Act on the Management of Agricultural Real Estate of the State Treasury in relation to the State Treasury Agricultural Property Stock; correspondingly, under the Act on the Shaping of the Agricultural System, the requirements are a written agreement with a certified date, three years of performance of the lease, and inclusion of the land in the lessee’s family farm); the notary notifies the lessee of the content of the sale agreement. In the case of a gift, the right of pre-emption does not apply because there is no sale. Acquisition by a close relative does not require the status of an individual farmer, and in the case of a sale to a close relative the provisions on the statutory right of pre-emption do not apply.
For the lessee, the realistic scenario is the continued cultivation of the land on the existing terms, with rent being settled with the new owner; the risk of losing the land arises only where the agreement is not in writing with a certified date or the thing has not been delivered. For the transferring parent and the family acquirer, three control points are material before the transaction:
Correction. The procedural position of the Polish entrepreneur is exceptionally weak. The EUIPO Board of Appeal has already twice questioned the credibility of his explanations, with costs of EUR 1,630 awarded, and the “original” etymology of “hala + land” must be treated by the General Court as an exogenous explanation, that is, one advanced after the event. A sign phonetically identical to the surname of a star player was filed two days before Haaland’s own application, which in itself points to monitoring of the athlete’s plans and undermines the claim that the applicant was unaware of him.
The key provision is Article 59(1)(b) of Regulation (EU) 2017/1001, under which an EU trade mark is liable to be declared invalid where the applicant was acting in bad faith when filing the application.
The EUIPO twice found in favour of the footballer, ordering the Polish applicant to pay EUR 1,630 in procedural costs.
A Polish entrepreneur who registered the EU trade mark “HAALAND” for 16 classes of goods has already lost that registration before the EUIPO and now risks not only losing the dispute, but also incurring further costs: in addition to the EUR 1,630 awarded in the administrative proceedings, costs of the proceedings before the General Court of the European Union may follow. His action is an appeal against the EUIPO decisions, not a new dispute with the footballer; the only issue is whether the invalidation of the mark on the basis of bad faith and Haaland’s earlier rights was correct. The second possible ground is Article 60(2) of Regulation (EU) 2017/1001, which allows a mark to be invalidated where use of that mark may be prohibited by virtue of an earlier right to a name or image — both of which belong to Erling Haaland.
The EUIPO twice found in favour of the footballer, and the Board of Appeal considered implausible the entrepreneur’s explanation that he did not associate the name with the footballer and did not follow his performances because foreign leagues are available in Poland only through paid services. Bad faith at the time of filing is a factual assessment: what matters is whether, on the filing date, the applicant knew of the well-known individual and intentionally sought to appropriate his name for goods typical of his public image, such as sportswear, football boots, isotonic drinks, supplements and smartwatches. The filing of the “HAALAND” mark at the turn of 2022 and 2023, coupled with a formal opposition filed only two days after Haaland’s application to register “Erling Haaland”, is a circumstance strongly adverse to the Polish applicant. In proceedings before the General Court of the European Union, the parties may rely on Article 61(1) of Regulation (EU) 2017/1001, which limits the exception to acquiescence through five years’ use precisely in cases of bad-faith filing — demonstrating that bad faith is the ground with the strongest effect in this system. Under Article 63(1) of Regulation (EU) 2017/1001, an application for invalidity under Article 59 may be filed by any natural or legal person, so Haaland’s standing is not in doubt; Article 64(5) further provides that a mark is to be declared invalid in respect of the goods for which registration was impermissible, and otherwise the application is to be rejected. The Court does not conduct a full evidentiary hearing anew; it reviews the EUIPO decisions, and its first step will be to decide whether to dismiss the action or list it for hearing.
There are two realistic scenarios: