Member Aldis Gobzems had previously proposed Article 111 of the Constitution to provide that forced vaccination and imposing restrictions on unvaccinated persons is forbidden.
Six members of the CVK voted for the refusal to start the collection of signatures, two voted against. Gobzems did not attend the CVK meeting.
The decision may be appealed to the Supreme Court's Department of Administrative Affairs.
At the CVK meeting, various arguments were made in support of both the refusal of the Gobzema Party and of why such a collection of signatures should nevertheless be announced. For example, it was pointed out that the CVK is merely an electoral organizer and not an institution that should consider the substance of proposals.
However, the majority of CVK members supported the view that the Constitution should not contain norms of this nature and that this is a matter of specific laws.
If it seems to any person that a law restricting human rights is adopted, the Constitutional Court should refer such rules of law to the Constitutional Court for challenging, rather than amending the Constitution.
At the meeting, there was also a view that no one in Latvia planned to introduce compulsory vaccination and that no person could be vaccinated forcibly.
In the opinion of the Ombudsman, the draft amendments shall not be considered to have been fully developed in terms of both the form and the content thereof, so that it does not comply with the condition of the Constitution to submit a completely drafted amendment. The Justice Ministry has also concluded that the proposed amendments are not fully elaborated on the basis of content and do not fall within the Latvian legal system. Health Ministry stated that it did not support the proposed amendments.
