Address by the President of the Republic, Michel Temer, during the Signing Ceremony of Acts of Consolidation of the Normative Decrees of the Federal Government and Launch of the Planalto Legis Legislation App

Look, I want to, I want to ask everyone to collectively salute not only the panel here on the table, but also those in the auditorium.

And interesting, Justice Toffoli... A long time ago, when I was president of the Chamber, I received on one occasion here President Jorge Sampaio, from Portugal, and he told me, Justice Gilmar, that he was in Rio de Janeiro and attended a solemnity in which there were 10 speakers and there were 30 authorities.

So, he listened 300 times to the names of the same authorities, and therefore I'll take the liberty to salute everyone, but especially Gustavo, not only for his work, but also for his prestige.

Me must admit, one need only look at this room to prove my words, isn't it? An extraordinary prestige that makes us all in the government extremely happy.

And if I wanted to label this solemnity with a few words, the Lebanese governor, I would say that it would be the word "transparency", which I took from the speeches given here by Chief Justice Toffoli, Ms. Raquel Dodge, and Gustavo.

The first word is transparency, and the second is simplification, followed by the idea of legal certainty. Transparency because we are fulfilling a conditional precept that establishes that everyone has the right to access all acts of government, and in a way, I return to the second word, simplified, and as demonstrated by Gustavo, this app aims precisely to overcome those issues that afflicted the past. The 1980s, as Chief Justice Toffoli says, but my past is even more distant.

So I saw precisely this. You had to keep up with the official gazette or you had to keep up with the Lawyers' Association newsletter to get access to legislation.

Today, you are instantly following things, as Gustavo said, not only through that extract, what is being done from the SAJ news, but directly from the SAJ app.

So, transparency and simplification are revealed by these two, by these two factors.

But I also want to record something very important here to my friends, my colleagues, SAJ lawyers. I want to record the importance of compliance with the legal order, a fundamental thing. I receive Gustavo and many others who are going to dispatch with me, bringing hypotheses for sanction, hypotheses for veto, and I see in their exposition to me, Chief Justice Toffoli, the seriousness with which work is done here in SAJ.

I usually, of course, inquire out of curiosity, let's say, scientific, academic curiosity, but when I sign, I sign with the greatest security, with the greater certainty that I'm doing the best for the country. Because we must admit, when sanctioning any normative act, we are producing for the country.

But the great advantage, I think, of this simplification, of this de-bureaucratisation, of this consolidation of an immense number of normative acts of the executive power in a single decree, is in keeping with the idea that this history of producing too many normative acts is in fact incompatible with legal certainty, is it not, deputy? Because when you produce a new law, when you produce a new normative act, somehow if it is not very consequential, you unsettle social relationships.

I give an example of tax matters. For every new tax decree there are hundreds if not thousands, Justice Ives, lawsuits brought to the Judiciary. So having a stable legal order is ensuring social stability. And that is not our culture.

I remember, when I was president of the Chamber of Deputies at various times, Justice Gilmar, when there was the extraordinary summons, and at the end of the summons the press asked me: how many bills were discussed? If I said - Mozart know this well - 200 decrees, 200 bills, an absolute success of a summons. If I said, "Look, we've actually discussed three fundamental questions on three particular bills. One is public safety, another is healthcare, another is education" [This would be considered] an absolute, absolute failure of the summons. In other words, our political-legal culture is a culture that gives prestige to legislative production. When, in fact, this solemnity is revealing exactly that we have to simplify procedures. And the less we legislate, the better for instability because people... People will gradually realise that social order is stable.

As you know - I beg your leave to say truisms, but in the present day, trivialities, things that are legally trivial are fundamental, we must repeat them.

Because it's interesting how certain things are obvious, if they are not repeated constantly, they get lost. They get hampered.

So, let us say, when you, when you simplify, that way you are doing what? You are complying with the dictates of the legal order, of the conditional legal order, and I think that Gustavo Rocha and the whole team were able to do this here following the work that came from Justice Gilmar Mendes, Justice Toffoli, when they were here.

So, when Gustavo also says "Look, I'm very happy that the president, that everyone came here to the SAJ"... I come here with great pleasure, with great satisfaction, because I feel at home here, among the companions of the legal class, and a legal class that is diligently dedicated. This has already been mentioned by the gentleman that will be, again, director and conductor of the SAJ, our new, our new attorney general of the Union... You will see, you will see something else that we achieved in our administration was an extraordinary harmony, an internal harmony in the Executive branch. Because we do not have divergences in the Executive branch; on the contrary, in the face of a decentralisation that we proceeded to implement, that is, I gave our ministers a lot of freedom. Gustavo Rocha knows this, as Minister of Human Rights, and all the ministers, we have been able to produce much, haven't we?

But secondly, we get, I think, modesty aside, naturally... But we have been able to fulfil a constitutional precept that determines harmony and joint work, integration, cooperation between the powers of the State. And I and Prosecutor General Raquel Dodge, just recently participated in a governance event there in the Court of Auditors and pointed out exactly this aspect.

The extraordinary integration between the Federal Inspector General, Justice Wagner Rosário, the Federal Prosecution Service, the Courts of Auditors, and sequentially with these bodies, with the Executive, the Legislative and the Judiciary... This harmonisation is important.

And I think, and here is a tribute that I give to my fellow lawyers... This is the result of our formation, our constitution, our conception, which is a participatory conception. It is a cooperative conception, it is a conception of those who are in charge, if I'm allowed to repeat myself, exclusively via the legal dictates.

And we have achieved this harmony, then, as I am practically concluding our administration, and moreover all the reforms, which you know that we have all done, not just me. This even I confess... I will make an aside here. I was effusively greeted yesterday by the president of Chile. The speech he made admiring what we are doing in the country, but especially with this extraordinary harmony among the various public agencies... It was very welcomed there in Chile and much applauded.

So, at this moment, I say, interestingly, aside from all the reforms we have made... I think that this reform, and here I make another aside... Gustavo told me that he was going to sign this in a simple ceremony with the presence of Justice Gilmar and Justice Toffoli. Gustavo, this is a very important act, sir, because we've been working on this for a long time. We've been thinking for a long time of this, of a simplification that means de-bureaucratisation, that means more citizens have access to public documents. Let us do this on a greater solemnity. Of course, that's where Gustavo's prestige comes from. Gustavo was able to gather many people here of the highest calibre.

And, therefore, we have to celebrate this moment as one of the most important reforms we can make in our government. Started by Toffoli, started by Gilmar, going through all bodies of the executive, but finally consolidated here, in our government's SAJ.

My compliments.