In the face of the proposal by the President of the Assembly of the Republic, José Aguiar-Branco, who considered that former presidents of the Constitutional Court (TC) should be heard at a leaders' conference on the freedom of expression of deputies and its compatibility with possible "red lines", on Wednesday, most parties showed themselves to be aligned: the issue should, instead, be addressed internally, since it can be autonomously resolved in Parliament. The parliamentary group of the Socialist Party (PS) considered that this is "a matter eminently of self-regulation" of the functioning of the AR that should be resolved by itself, within the framework of the powers and rules enshrined in the AR's Standing Orders, while also stating that it does not completely reject the proposal. "Without prejudice to this understanding, the parliamentary group does not reject the proposal, referring the possibility or convenience of hearing entities external to the AR for its own discussion at a leaders' conference. This understanding prevents the immediate hearing of former Presidents of the Constitutional Court, but does not exclude it," the socialists pointed out. Along the same lines, the Left Bloc (BE) stressed that this matter deserves "a first debate [...] without resorting to personalities or external entities", since it is "a matter that the Assembly of the Republic, under the terms of its Standing Orders, can autonomously resolve", it can be read in the response to which the Lusa agency had access. The parliamentary group of Livre also stated, in a response to Aguiar-Branco, that the hearing of entities external to the Assembly of the Republic should be debated at the leaders' conference, having indicated that the debate is not only about "the limits of the freedom of expression of the deputies", but "about the duties of intervention of the President of the Assembly of the Republic under the terms of paragraph 3 of article 89 of the Standing Orders of the Assembly of the Republic". "In this sense, we request that prior to the discussion at the leaders' conference, the comparative dossier of procedural measures relating to decorum and parliamentary discourse of other European parliaments that was prepared in the last term be distributed to all parliamentary groups, which could serve as a basis for the debate", he added. In turn, the parliamentary leader of the Portuguese Communist Party (PCP), Paula Santos, defended that "more than hearings and listening to different opinions", the focus of the President of the Parliament should be the Constitution and the Standing Orders of the Assembly of the Republic. In Paula Santos' view, Aguiar-Branco "was not well last week", when he admitted that a deputy could say in Parliament that a certain ethnic group is "lazier or dumber". "We cannot admit that in the Assembly of the Republic - and we do not accept this - there is room for hate speech, racism, xenophobia, which seek to whitewash what colonialism is. This cannot happen and the President of the Assembly of the Republic must intervene and fulfill his duties", she said. The communist also pointed out that the rule of the Standing Orders of the Assembly of the Republic that provides for the intervention of the president when there are injurious and offensive speeches has existed "for a long time and there have been several processes of revision of the Standing Orders and this rule has always been maintained". "It is foreseen: no change is needed. It needs to be fulfilled and that is the role of the President of the Assembly of the Republic. He must comply", she reiterated. Aguiar-Branco's initiative was contained in a letter sent to the presidents of the parliamentary groups and to the PAN deputy, as well as to the "vice" of Parliament and members of the Bureau on the agenda of the next meeting of the leaders' conference. The issue arose after, on Friday morning, the leader of the far-right Chega party, André Ventura, referred to the working capacities of the Turkish people, in connection with the construction of the new Lisbon airport, which led the BE, Livre and PS benches to defend the intervention of the President of the Parliament to prevent this type of speech, which they considered to be "xenophobic". Even so, the President of the Assembly defended that it is not up to him to censor the positions or opinions of deputies, referring to the Public Prosecutor's Office for any possible criminal liability of parliamentary speech, a position that was criticized by all the Left-wing parties. Read Also: "Red lines"? Aguiar-Branco wants to hear former presidents of the TC (Portuguese version)