The Senate's justice committee
on Thursday voted in favour of combining a bill reforming
criminal proceedings with another on Italy's statute of
limitations.
As a result the rapporteurs of the bills, Giuseppe Cucca
and Felice Casson of Premier Matteo Renzi's centre-left
Democratic Party (PD), will be able to include measures to
extend the statute of limitations to the base text that will
probably be presented on Tuesday.
Many thousands of criminal cases time out every year and
the government is under pressure to take action to stop this
following a long series of corruption cases, some of which have
hit PD members.
Justice Minister Andrea Orlando said Wednesday he was
"reasonably optimistic" the PD could reach an agreement with its
junior coalition partners, after the centrist NCD said extending
the statute of limitations risked making snail-paced trials drag
on even more.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED © Copyright ANSA