Hungarian MP János Pócs has been banned from entering Parliament for three sitting days because of repeated disruptive behaviour, House Speaker Ágnes Forsthoffer announced. The decision follows several verbal warnings and a written reprimand, which she said had failed to change the Fidesz politician’s conduct.
Forsthoffer said in a Facebook post that Pócs had repeatedly disregarded his parliamentary duties, broken the rules and disrupted the work of the National Assembly. He received the decision on Thursday morning and has eight days to appeal to Parliament’s Immunity Committee.
The ban means that Pócs cannot enter the Parliament building or its offices during the three sitting days. However, he may still take part in secret ballots in a room designated by the Speaker.
From shouting to filming with illuminated glasses
Forsthoffer said that MPs are both entitled and obliged to attend parliamentary sessions and votes, take an active part in the Assembly’s work and help ensure its effective operation – or at least refrain from disrupting it.
She listed several examples of Pócs’s behaviour, including shouting from the floor, filming during sessions, recording with illuminated glasses, playing bingo, displaying signs deemed offensive to the dignity of Parliament, deliberately reading books and newspapers as a provocation, drawing, straying from the subject under discussion and loudly talking to people in the gallery while repeatedly entering and leaving the chamber.
The latest incident took place on 3 November, when Pócs missed an electronic vote. According to Forsthoffer, he then caused an uproar by attempting, after some hesitation, to cast his vote verbally once the voting period had ended.
Pócs reportedly said he had not intended to mislead the chair but admitted that he had not known what was happening in the chamber at the time.
Forsthoffer argued that the incident was unacceptable, particularly from an experienced MP serving his fifth parliamentary term. She said Pócs should have followed the displays in the chamber and the information shown on his own voting device, as well as the words of the presiding officer, all of which made it clear that he had missed the deadline.
“He simply was not paying attention,” she wrote.
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Previous warnings failed to change his conduct
The Speaker said the incident disrupted both the parliamentary session and the work of the person chairing it, and was not an isolated case.
She recalled that she had issued Pócs with a written warning on 20 October, expressing her trust that she would not have to impose sanctions on him again. He had also received numerous verbal warnings and had previously been deprived of the right to speak during sessions.
Forsthoffer said she chose a three-sitting-day ban in accordance with the principle of proportionality, noting that Pócs’s actions had not invalidated the Assembly’s decision.
Under the rules outlined by the Speaker, an MP banned by the Speaker cannot enter the Parliament building or its offices, while an MP excluded from a session may still enter Parliament but cannot participate in the sitting, except during votes. The maximum ban imposed by the Speaker is 15 calendar days or six sitting days.
