Limits of execution
Article 154 states what an executive committee may not do. Each prohibition is absolute.
- Article 154(1)A committee may in no case adopt the plan, allocate resources, fix a ceiling, alter an ecological budget, or exercise a power that Title II or Title IV confers on another organ.
- Article 154(2)A committee may in no case legislate in a matter reserved to organic law, restrict a right of Title III by regulation, or amend an act of the Assembly.
- Article 154(3)A regulation exceeding the law it executes is void, and any person may challenge it under Article 43.
- Article 154(4)A committee may in no case alienate a commons resource, grant an exclusive right over knowledge, or submit the Republic to a foreign or arbitral jurisdiction.
- Article 154(6)The union of legislative and executive functions in the Assembly enlarges the powers of neither.
Reason the plan lies elsewhere
The plan and the allocation of resources are kept from the Assembly itself and from its committees alike. Both belong to the organs of Title IV: the National Planning Congress, the regional economic councils, the branch federations and the assemblies.
The ceilings within which all of them work are determined by the Ecological Budget Authority, which Article 24(1) makes independent of the executive committees, of the planning bodies and of the Assembly.
Challenging a regulation
A regulation exceeding the law it executes is void, and any person may challenge it under Article 43. No showing of personal interest is required where the action concerns the rights of Title III, the ecological budgets, the distribution of functions, or the participation the Constitution requires. Court fees, security for costs and adverse costs orders are excluded.
The regulation on communal record systems was annulled on 18 March 2026 upon such a challenge, brought by a resident.
Personal liability
Article 43(4): the persons who decided upon or executed a violation are personally liable, and the liability of the organisation extinguishes none of it.
Article 162(3) and Article 229(2): an office, a mandate or an instruction from a superior in no case exonerates the author of an act.
Acts void in every case
Article 265 lists the acts void whoever adopts them and by whatever procedure, and the nullity extends to a measure attaining such a result in substance whatever its form, its designation or its stated purpose. A regulation is reached by both, and any person may plead the nullity before any court at any time.