Teisė ISSN 1392-1274 eISSN 2424-6050

2025, vol. 136, pp. 146–160 DOI: https://doi.org/10.15388/Teise.2025.136.10

Teisės aktualijos / Problems of Law

The Welfare of the Child as a Legal and Extra-Legal Value to be Protected in Civil Proceedings

Joanna Bodio
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0428-7267
Assoc. Prof. PhD, Dr Habil.
Deputy Director of the Institute of Legal Sciences
Mobility Erasmus+ Coordinator
Faculty of Law and Administration
Maria Curie-Sklodowska University
Pl. M. Curie-Skłodowskiej 5
20-031 Lublin, Poland
E-mail: joanna.bodio@mail.umcs.pl

The Welfare of the Child as a Legal and Extra-Legal Value to be Protected in Civil Proceedings

Joanna Bodio
(Maria Curie-Sklodowska University (Poland))

The aim of this article is to show how the ‘welfare of the child’ is implemented in civil proceedings as a legal value (a legal principle) and a non-legal value (a general clause). Therefore, it is necessary to first refer to legal theories defining the concept and relationship between general clauses and legal principles in order to identify procedural and non-procedural provisions and procedural institutions implementing the principle of the welfare of the child in litigation and non-litigious proceedings.
The research encompasses Polish Civil Procedural Law and scholarly literature insights regarding the welfare of the child. The analysis has revealed that the introduction of the general clause of ‘the welfare of the child’ into a specific legal provision, as well as the application of the principle of the welfare of the child within various procedural institutions, allows the court, within the limits provided for by law, to make decisions that it considers optimal in the specific situation of the child. Therefore, the Code and non-Code regulations include provisions directly referring to the welfare of the child, but also those in which this concept does not appear, yet there is no doubt that they serve to promote the welfare of the child. This trend in civil proceedings is reflected in the content of general provisions concerning guardianship proceedings, provisions which aim to empower the child and grant them the status of a party in a trial or a participant in non-litigious proceedings, provisions granting the child legal capacity, making the performance of certain acts dependent on the consent of the minor, implementing the right to hear the child, or provisions introducing protection for children appearing as witnesses.
Keywords: child’s welfare, rule of law, general clause, civil proceedings.

Vaiko gerovė kaip civiliniame procese ginama teisinė ir neteisinė vertybė

Joanna Bodio
(Marijos Kiuri-Sklodovskos universitetas (Lenkija))

Šio straipsnio tikslas – parodyti, kaip vaiko gerovė civiliniame procese įgyvendinama kaip teisinė vertybė (teisės principas) ir neteisinė vertybė (bendroji išlyga). Todėl pirmiausia būtina remtis teisės teorijomis, apibrėžiančiomis bendrųjų išlygų ir teisės principų sąvoką bei ryšį, siekiant nustatyti procesines ir neprocesines nuostatas bei procesines institucijas, įgyvendinančias vaiko gerovės principą teisminėse ir neteisminėse bylose.
Tyrimas apima Lenkijos civilinio proceso teisės ir mokslinės literatūros įžvalgas apie vaiko gerovę. Analizė parodė, kad bendrosios vaiko gerovės išlygos įtraukimas į konkrečią teisės nuostatą, taip pat vaiko gerovės principo taikymas įvairiose procesinėse institucijose leidžia teismui, neviršijant įstatymų numatytų ribų, priimti sprendimus, kuriuos jis mano esant optimalius konkrečioje vaiko situacijoje. Todėl Civiliniame kodekse ir kituose teisės aktuose yra nuostatų, tiesiogiai susijusių su vaiko gerove, bet yra ir tokių teisės aktų, kuriuose ši sąvoka neaptinkama, tačiau neabejotina, kad jos padeda skatinti vaiko gerovę. Ši civilinio proceso tendencija atsispindi bendrųjų nuostatų, susijusių su globos bylomis, turinyje, nuostatose, kuriomis siekiama suteikti vaikui galių ir šalies teisme arba dalyvio ne ginčo teisena procese statusą, nuostatose, suteikiančios vaikui teisnumą, tam tikrų veiksmų atlikimą siejant su nepilnamečio sutikimu, įgyvendinant teisę išklausyti vaiką arba nustatant apsaugos nuostatas vaikams, dalyvaujantiems kaip liudytojams.
Pagrindiniai žodžiai: vaiko gerovė, teisinė valstybė, bendroji išlyga, civilinis procesas.

___________

Received: 31/8/2025. Accepted: 22/10/2025
Copyright © 2025 Joanna Bodio. Published by Vilnius University Press
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

Introduction

Value as a basic category of axiology is an ambiguous term. It means “everything that is valuable and desirable, that constitutes the goal of human endeavour”1, but it is also a characteristic or a set of characteristics inherent in a person or a thing, constituting its qualities (e.g., moral qualities), valuable to people, that can satisfy some of their needs, e.g., significance, the importance of someone or something2, or a thing or trait of value, something to which value is attributed, or a thought that makes objects, events and traits considered valuable3. ‘Value’ also refers to an idea, a criterion, a principle, which makes it possible to evaluate it positively or negatively4.

The need to provide legal protection to values common to a community is reflected in various branches of law5, including the civil procedure. The broadest category of values with which the law is most closely associated, whether by way of incorporation or extrinsic references, is moral values (e.g., the welfare of the child). Values, if understood in this way, can, at the same time, also be legal values if they are expressed in legal provisions in the form of judgments of the legislator6.

The injunction to be guided by the welfare of the child when considering all matters concerning him/her has a constitutional rank in Poland, expressed (albeit not explicitly) in Articles 18, 47, 48, 71, 72 of the Polish Constitution7. Despite the lack of use of the construct ‘the welfare of the child’ in constitutional provisions, there is no doubt that it is a legally protected value to be covered by the activities of the state and other entities8. The recognition of the welfare of the child as an intrinsic constitutional value imposes an obligation on the legislator to create specific norms allowing the welfare of the child to be implemented in the process of interpretation and application of each legal provision regulating the legal situation of the child9, becoming the objective of the interpretation of legal provisions10. The ‘welfare of the child’ may be the objective (ratio legis) of both a specific provision and a group of provisions or a larger area within the legal system. Indeed, there are regulations in the legal system in which: 1) the construct ‘the welfare of the child’ is a visible part of the legal provision; 2) ‘the welfare of the child’ does not appear as an element of the normative construct, but the linguistic context of the normative acts indicates the presence of this extra-legal value to be taken into account when assessing the situation of the child; 3) there are other constructs whose scope of meaning is similar to the scope of meaning of the welfare of the child, e.g., ‘the welfare of a juvenile’, ‘the welfare of a minor’11.

Consideration of the welfare of the child is therefore manifested on two levels: the first – legislative – is characterised by the fact that the legislator is guided by this directive when drafting the law; whereas, the second level concerns the application of the law and its interpretation. Even when the law in a particular case does not refer to the concept of the child’s welfare, every entity deciding the child’s case (court), or dealing with the child (e.g., administrative, educational, social bodies and institutions12) is obliged, when making this decision, to take into account the child’s welfare13. Indeed, the legislator refers to the postulate of the child’s welfare in two ways: either by using this concept in individual provisions, or by shaping certain institutions of law directly or indirectly related to the interests of the child14.

The purpose of this article is to indicate how the ‘welfare of the child’ is implemented in civil recognition proceedings as a legal value (a principle of law) and extra-legal value (a general clause). In this regard, it is first necessary to draw on the constructs of legal theory, defining the concept and relationship of the general clauses and principles of law, in order to identify the procedural and extra-procedural rules and procedural institutions that implement the principle of the child’s welfare in trial and non-trial proceedings.

The research method used in the article is the formal-dogmatic method. It is based on the legal regulations of the civil procedure, legal theory, and theoretical assumptions, using established methods of interpretation (linguistic, systemic, and logical). Methodologically, practical application of law is also considered, using an analysis of Supreme Court Case Law.

1. The Welfare of the Child as a Legal Value (Legal Principle) and Extra-Legal Value (General Clause)

Since the welfare of the child is important not only in the process of creating law, but also in its application, on the one hand, it is treated as a legal principle (in the directive sense, i.e., as a legal norm belonging to a given legal system15 and as an idea guiding the creation and interpretation of law), and, on the other hand, as a general clause16 (defined in a provision) which is important for the interpretation of provisions. A legal principle can be specified in general clauses17.

In academia, a general clause is understood as a vague phrase which is part of a legal provision; referring to generally oriented, evaluative non-legal criteria; whose specific content is determined in the process of applying the law18. General clauses constitute the so-called extra-systemic references which require the assessment of legal concepts in an axiologically engaged manner. The application of general clauses essentially boils down to three levels of qualification: determining whether specific assessments fall within the scope of the general clause, determining whether the facts relevant to the application of the clause are consistent or inconsistent with that assessment, and identifying the facts that fall within or outside the scope of the legal norm. The purpose of applying general clauses is to introduce non-legal and socially accepted assessments that function objectively into the process of applying the law19. A clause is a norm that requires a specific value or non-legal norm to be taken into account in the process of applying the law20.

The names of the general criteria of reference clauses “usually consist of two parts, one of which defines the type of values, assessments or norms (principles, considerations, interests, goods, etc.) and the other specifies the sphere of social reality on the basis of which the interpreter identifies the content of the phrase (social, public, individual, etc.), sometimes with an indication of an axiological formula (justice, fairness, coexistence) or a factual formula (custom)”21. The welfare of the child seems to meet all the criteria necessary for it to be considered a reference clause22, as it expresses only abstract assessments (values) leading to specific, situation-based evaluative statements – i.e., moral values. The most important characteristics of such phrases are: semantic vagueness, the evaluative nature of the extra-legal reference, and the derivation of a specific assessment23.

The ‘welfare of the child’ in the form of a vague phrase allows for flexible adaptation of the conceptual category to a specific situation and for the protection of the child’s rights to the fullest extent possible, while taking into account circumstances unknown to the legislator24.

General clauses are cross-sectoral in nature, which is reflected in the fact that structures of this type occur in individual branches of law, but they also share many other similarities that break down the traditional division of the legal system into branches25.

The welfare of the child is implemented not only as an extra-legal value (a general clause), but also as a legal value (a legal principle). A legal principle is defined as a norm which, in comparison with other norms, is fundamental, superior, more general, and protects a particularly valuable good26. Legal principles constitute its fundamental assumptions, which express institutional solutions characteristic of a given system or branch27. In the context of referring to legal principles understood in this way to the general clause, it is essential that the principles should express values adopted by the legislator, and that these values should underlie more detailed legal regulations28. L. Leszczyński points out that the element distinguishing legal principles from general clauses in the context of determining their content is that the ‘search’ for the content of a principle takes place within the legal system, i.e., within the framework of values that the legislator specifies ‘more clearly’ and protects through a normative system, while, in the case of a clause, this search takes place outside the system of legally defined values. A principle is a ‘complete’ legal norm, while a clause is part of a normative statement29. Therefore, it is not entirely possible to establish an unambiguous conceptual scope between a legal principle and a general clause due to the multitude of concepts and divisions of legal principles, and also due to the fact that the fundamental nature of norms is determined primarily by inconsistent scholarly opinion, as well as the distinction between rules based on regulations and generally recognised rules, the differentiation between many degrees of generality of legal rules, and the recognition of norms containing general clauses as legal rules30. It is assumed that the welfare of the child as a principle can also be taken into account wherever there is no explicit reference to the clause on the welfare of the child31.

2. The Welfare of the Child as a Value Subject to be Protected in Civil Proceedings

The welfare of the child permeates various branches of both substantive law (the Family and Guardianship Code32) and procedural law (the Code of Civil Procedure33 and other acts to which the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure on non-contentious proceedings apply accordingly)34.

As an overriding value requiring special guarantees from the state, the welfare of the child should be taken into account whenever a child is a party to civil proceedings or a participant in non-litigious proceedings35, but also when the child participates in civil proceedings in other forms, e.g., as a witness or a person subject to a hearing. The welfare of the child should also be taken into account by the legislator when creating procedural institutions for the protection of children’s rights.

As the ‘welfare of the child’ is the basis for the interpretation of legal acts whose object of protection is the child36, all actions taken on behalf of the child should be aimed at protecting his or her welfare, regardless of whether it is directly indicated as a general clause in procedural law37 or whether it results as a legal principle from various procedural solutions aimed at protecting the rights of the child and his or her empowerment.

The Code of Civil Procedure uses the concept of the welfare of: a child (Article 5791 § 3, 5792 § 4, Article 586 § 4 of the Code of Civil Procedure), a minor (Article 5751 of the Code of Civil Procedure), a person concerned by the proceedings (Article 577 of the Code of Civil Procedure), and a person subject to parental authority or under guardianship or care (Articles 59812 and 590 of the Code of Civil Procedure)38. On the other hand, the Act on the Support and Rehabilitation of Minors39 uses the concept of the welfare of the minor in Article 3. Although some provisions use legal constructs other than the welfare of the child, they also apply to children. This is because each of these legal constructs covers a broader group of entities than children. A person under guardianship, subject to the care of a guardian, or whose conduct is being investigated, or a person in relation to whom educational, therapeutic or corrective measures are being taken (minors) may be, in addition to a child, also an adult.

In addition to being explicitly mentioned in the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure, the welfare of the child and related concepts also serve as an interpretative guideline in cases where there is no explicit statutory regulation40. Therefore, it is not only in those provisions which explicitly refer to the welfare of the child (a minor, a person concerned by the proceedings, a person subject to parental authority or under guardianship, an underage person) that the court is obliged to care for this welfare. The welfare of the child is at the core of all provisions on the rights of the child41, “being the proverbial spirit of the law”. At the same time, it is an instrument for interpreting the norms contained in the Polish Constitution and national law, as well as a guideline for lawmaking and application of law, and a criterion for assessing decisions in matters concerning children and resolving conflicts of interest between children and other persons, especially parents42. Therefore, civil proceedings, guided by the principle of the welfare of the child, establish legal norms aimed at implementing this value43, not only when this term is used in specific legal provisions, but also when it regulates entire institutions of civil proceedings, directly or only indirectly related to the interests of the child, and thus results from the entirety of these provisions44.

Apart from provisions that explicitly refer to the welfare of the child (Article 5791 § 3, Article 586 § 4, Article 5751, Article 590, Article 577, Article 59812 § 2 of the Code of Civil Procedure), there are provisions in the Code of Civil Procedure that implement this principle implicitly. It results from:

– Article 7 of the Code of Civil Procedure concerning the possibility for a prosecutor to bring an action in non-property matters in the field of family law;

– Article 17 point 1 of the Code of Civil Procedure concerning the transfer of the aforementioned family matters to the jurisdiction of district courts;

– Article 32 of the Code of Civil Procedure concerning alternative local jurisdiction in cases concerning maintenance claims and the determination of a child’s origin and related claims;

– Article 42 of the Code of Civil Procedure concerning the exclusive territorial jurisdiction of the court of the claimant’s place of residence in cases concerning the relationship between parents and children and between the adopter and the adoptee45;

– Articles 2161–2162 of the Code of Civil Procedure and Article 576 of the Code of Civil Procedure concerning the possibility of hearing a child;

– Article 267 of the Code of Civil Procedure exempting minors under 17 years of age from taking an oath;

– Article 306 of the Code of Civil Procedure concerning the collection of blood from a minor;

– Article 333 § 1 point 1 of the Code of Civil Procedure introducing the obligation for the court to automatically grant immediate enforceability to a judgment awarding maintenance (if it awards maintenance – for instalments payable after the date of filing the claim, and for instalments payable before the date of filing the claim for a period not exceeding three months);

– Article 3983 § 2 and Article 4242 of the Code of Civil Procedure, enabling the Ombudsman for Children to lodge a cassation appeal and an appeal for a declaration of unlawfulness of a final judgment if the judgment violated the rights of the child46;

– Article 430 of the Code of Civil Procedure, which prohibits the examination of minors under the age of thirteen and descendants of the parties under the age of seventeen as witnesses in matrimonial cases;

– Article 433 of the Code of Civil Procedure, which lists the mandatory elements of the hearing record (the first item listed is “a statement by the spouses regarding the number, age and sex of living children”);

– Article 434 of the Code of Civil Procedure concerning the possibility for the court to order a designated person to conduct a social inquiry in order to determine the conditions in which the parties’ children live and are raised;

– Article 4531 of the Code of Civil Procedure granting minor parents with limited legal capacity, if they are over sixteen years of age, legal capacity in cases concerning the determination or denial of the child’s origin and the determination of the ineffectiveness of the recognition of paternity;

– Article 509 of the Code of Civil Procedure introducing a lay judge panel in adoption cases47;

– all general provisions on guardianship proceedings, i.e., Article 568 of the Code of Civil Procedure (concerning the territorial jurisdiction of the guardianship court), Article 570 of the Code of Civil Procedure (concerning the possibility of initiating guardianship proceedings ex officio), Article 5701 of the Code of Civil Procedure (concerning the conduct of a social inquiry), Article 572 of the Code of Civil Procedure (concerning the notification of the guardianship court of an event justifying the initiation of proceedings ex officio), Article 573 of the Code of Civil Procedure (concerning the participation of a minor in the proceedings), Article 574 of the Code of Civil Procedure (concerning the personal appearance of a minor), Article 577 of the Code of Civil Procedure (allowing the guardianship court to change its decision, even if it is final, if the welfare of the person concerned so requires), or Article 5792 of the Code of Civil Procedure (concerning the need to seek an opinion before placing a child in a foster family or a family-type children’s home)48, Article 586 § 4 of the Code of Civil Procedure (in which the ‘welfare of the child’ is a prerequisite for seeking the opinion of a specialist institution by a court adjudicating in adoption cases)49.

Scholars in the field emphasise that, although the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure do not contain a central reference to the principle of the best interests of the child, which appears in specific cases as a premise for a decision, it should be applied when interpreting all provisions of the Code if the case concerns a child. Therefore, G. Jędrejek believes that, in the event of a conflict between the linguistic interpretation of a provision and the principle of the welfare of the child, priority should be given to the latter. Consequently, it is possible to depart from the linguistic interpretation of a procedural provision if this is in the best interests of the child, as is evident in Article 577 of the Code of Civil Procedure50.

The implementation of the principle of the welfare of the child also results (albeit indirectly) from non-Code laws to which provisions on non-litigious proceedings apply, i.e., from:

– Articles 23a, 25 and 32 of the Act on the Professions of Physician and Dentist51 concerning consent to the treatment of a minor or his or her participation in a medical experiment;

– Articles 41, 131, 15, 23, 30a, 37, 40, 404 and 421 of the Act on Upbringing in Sobriety and Counteracting Alcoholism52 concerning: conducting preventive information and education activities and training activities in the field of solving alcohol problems, counteracting drug addiction and behavioural addictions, as well as activities aimed at providing meals to children participating in extracurricular care, educational and sociotherapeutic programmes; the prohibition of advertising, promotion, sale and serving of alcoholic beverages to minors; assistance to children of alcohol-addicted persons; compulsory treatment of minors addicted to alcohol staying in correctional facilities and shelters for minors; conducting a social inquiry by a court-appointed guardian to determine the circumstances indicating alcohol abuse by an alcoholic, including their behaviour towards minors; admitting minors to sobering-up stations, institutions and detention by the police and release from these institutions;

– Articles 10, 22, 29, 30, 582 and 59 of the Act on Counteracting Drug Addiction53 concerning: conducting preventive information, education and training activities in the field of solving drug addiction problems, in particular for children and young people, including sports and recreational activities for students, as well as activities aimed at providing meals for children participating in extracurricular care, educational and sociotherapeutic programmes; compulsory treatment and rehabilitation of minors addicted to drugs; introduction of sanctions for providing intoxicating agents, psychotropic substances or new psychoactive substances to minors or persuading them to use such agents or substances;

– Articles 4, 7, 10b, 21–23, 38 of the Mental Health Protection Act54 concerning: preventive measures in the field of mental health protection of minors; provision of education, remedial and educational classes and rehabilitation for mentally disabled children and young people; cooperation between the Ombudsman for Patients’ Rights in Psychiatric Hospitals and the Ombudsman for Children’s Rights; subjecting a minor to a psychiatric examination and compulsory admission to a psychiatric hospital or nursing home; judicial control over the compulsory placement of a minor in a psychiatric hospital;

– Article 4a Section 4 of the Act on Family Planning, Protection of the Human Foetus and Conditions for the Admissibility of Termination of Pregnancy55 concerning: cooperation between central-government and local-government authorities and churches, religious associations and social organisations in the adoption of children; consent of a minor to termination of pregnancy;

– Articles 4, 5, and 12 of the Act on the Collection, Storage, and Transplantation of Cells, Tissues, and Organs56 concerning: the conditions for the admissibility of the collection of tissues, cells and organs from a living donor; consent to the collection of bone marrow or haematopoietic cells from peripheral blood from a minor57;

– Articles 3, 4, 6–22, 23–24, 27, 29, 32, 34, 35–36, 39 in conjunction with Articles 38, 42–51, 57, 62, 64, 65, 70, 79, 80, 81, 92, 143, 145, 148–153, 286 of the Act on the Support and Rehabilitation of Minors58 concerning: the standardisation of the principle of the welfare of the minor; the obligation to prevent the demoralisation of minors; the use of measures to prevent the demoralisation of minors and their commission of criminal offences; the jurisdiction of the family court; the appropriate application of the provisions of the Code of Civil Procedure on guardianship proceedings (non-litigious); the principle of holding hearings behind closed doors; the right of minors to inspect case files and their exclusion; the supervision of the family court over the activities of the Police and Border Guard; the establishment of minors as ‘parties to the proceedings’ and determining their rights; appointing a legal representative for the minor; applying temporary measures and detention to the minor; mediation; hearing and questioning the minor; conducting a social inquiry; obtaining the opinion of a team of court specialists or a juvenile shelter; examination of the minor’s mental health; the possibility for the minor to appeal against the decision and exemption of the minor from the obligation to comply with the formal requirements of appeals lodged by him or her in person; prohibition of reformatio in peius against the minor; the minor’s obligations in enforcement proceedings; supervision by the family judge over the enforcement of decisions; the possibility of changing or revoking educational measures by the family court; the minor’s obligation to behave in a certain way; determining the manner in which the court supervises the performance of the obligations imposed on the minor’s parents (guardians).

In each of these cases, when making a decision regarding a child, the court must be guided by the child’s welfare59.

Summary

The protection of children’s rights has a specific and visible impact on the functioning of the entire legal system whose main premise is the requirement to take into account the ‘welfare of the child’ in the process of law-making and law enforcement (in the course of establishing facts, legal findings, and in the justification of judgments)60. The criterion of the ‘welfare of the child’ is protected in civil proceedings both as a dominant and an independent value and as an accessory value complementing the value of the family, motherhood or parenthood. In cases directly concerning the legal situation of a child, the ‘welfare of the child’ should be the basic criterion for interpretation and decision-making, while in cases indirectly concerning the situation of a child, the ‘welfare of the child’ reinforces or corrects the interpretation of legal provisions61.

The implementation of the principle of the welfare of the child does not only cover those regulations in which this term is used expressis verbis, but it results from the existence of many provisions which constitute a manifestation of a more generally formulated norm of conduct62. The welfare of the child should therefore be taken into account when applying any legal provision relating to the situation of the child as an overriding good63. This is the result of a broad interpretation of the principle of the welfare of the child64, which determines the shape of various institutional solutions. This principle should be an instrument for interpreting norms and a guideline for creating and applying law, as well as a criterion for assessing decisions in matters concerning children and resolving conflicts of interest between children and other persons65.

The ‘saturation’ of the provisions of an entire legal act (e.g., the Code of Civil Procedure) with criteria derived from the ‘welfare of the child’ clause also occurs when the clause is not expressly stated in its initial provisions but appears in many different legal institutions66. The introduction of a general ‘welfare of the child’ clause into a specific legal provision, as well as the application of the principle of the welfare of the child within various procedural institutions, allows the court, within the limits provided for by law, to make decisions that it considers optimal in the specific situation of the child67, taking into account a positive assessment of the child’s situation from the perspective of the social hierarchy of values. The social hierarchy of values should be the source of social norms according to which the concept of the welfare of the child should be assessed in a specific case68.

The welfare of the child as a premise for a court decision is examined in each specific case, while taking into account individual circumstances69. The use of the clause of the welfare of the child allows, on a case-by-case basis, to find the optimal solution, while taking into account both the individual characteristics of the child, his or her specific situation, and the actual possibilities available70. The presence of general clauses increases judicial discretion, allowing for an individual assessment of each individual case and making the law more flexible in its application, which avoids overly frequent normative changes. The clauses thus promote legal stability and evolutionary – rather than revolutionary – changes71.

Therefore, among the provisions of the Code and other regulations, there are provisions that directly refer to the welfare of the child, but also those in which this concept does not appear, and yet there is no doubt that they serve to promote the welfare of the child72. This trend in civil proceedings is reflected in the content of general provisions concerning guardianship proceedings, provisions which aim to empower the child and grant them the status of a party to the proceedings or a participant in non-litigious proceedings, provisions granting the child’s legal capacity, making the performance of certain acts conditional on the consent of the minor, implementing the right to hear the child, or provisions introducing protection for children appearing as witnesses.

Bibliography

Legal acts

Act of 9 June 2022 on the support and rehabilitation of minors. Journal of Laws 2024.978, consolidated text.

Act of 29 July 2005 on counteracting drug addiction. Journal of Laws 2023.1939, consolidated text.

Act of 19 August 1994 on mental health protection. Journal of Laws 2024.917, consolidated text.

Act of 7 January 1993 on family planning, protection of the human foetus and conditions for the admissibility of abortion. Journal of Laws 2022.1575, consolidated text.

Act of 1 July 2005 on the collection, storage and transplantation of cells, tissues and organs. Journal of Laws 2023.1185, consolidated text.

Act of 5 December 1996 on the professions of physician and dentist. Journal of Laws 2024.1287, consolidated text.

Act of 26 October 1982 on sobriety education and counteracting alcoholism. Journal of Laws 2023.2151, consolidated text.

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Case law

Supreme Court resolution (7) of 5 November 1945, I C 110/45, OSNC 1946/3, item 47.

Supreme Court resolution of 26 April 1952, C Prez. 498/51, OSNC 1952/1, item 1.

Constitutional Tribunal judgment of 28 April 2003, K 18/02, OTK ZU 2003/4, item 32.

Constitutional Tribunal ruling of 29 June 2016, SK 24/15, OTK-A 2016/46.