Speech by the State Advocate General, Avv. Oscar Fiumara, on the occasion of the inauguration ceremony of the judicial year at the Court of Cassation on January 30, 2009 Mr. President of the Republic, Authorities, Mr. President of the Court of Cassation, Ladies and Gentlemen also in 2008, as in previous years , the State Attorney's Office was one of the major players on the judicial scene. New business for the year amounted to a total of 170,000 (in addition to some hundreds of thousands of cases still pending in previous years), with over 145,000 sentences in the various orders and degrees of judgment (for the AG headquarters alone 47,000 new business and 60,000 sentences); note that each deal can involve multiple degrees of judgment. It is an imposing dispute that we would not like to boast about: considering, in fact, that the State is almost always the defendant or the defendant, it is an indication of a Community malaise to whose needs the State is unable to provide adequate responses. The spectrum of subjects covered is the most varied imaginable. The Advocacy has dealt with some of the most important and delicate disputes before all supranational and national judicial bodies. I would like to recall, purely by way of example, among the approximately 300 deals dealt with before the community judges, the questions on the protection of the Italian language, on equality between men and women, on the VAT amnesty; before the Constitutional Court (over 500 new affairs) the litigation on state and regional laws and delicate issues of constitutional legitimacy in an incidental way; before the ordinary judges the vast litigation, often with serial connotations, regarding the Pinto law, the liability for damage to health resulting from the use of asbestos, depleted uranium, infected blood; the important initiatives taken to obtain reparation for environmental damage; the criminal trials for the events of the G8 in Genoa, the Nassirya massacre, electromagnetic emissions, the Italian desaparesidos in Argentina; the constitutions of a civil party in the trials concerning the mafia, the racketeering; equally substantial is the dispute before the administrative judges, which often intersects, for various aspects (indeed still not fully clarified) with that of ordinary judges (in this regard it will be interesting to verify the impact of the recent final ruling of the SS.UU. of the Cassation in the matter of administrative preliminary ruling); the various disputes regarding public works contracts and public supplies (1170 business, of which only a low percentage - 75 cases - initiated before arbitration boards); the well-known lawsuits on the expansion of the US military base in Vicenza (Dal Molin); the delicate and numerous disputes concerning the ordinary judiciary, in which we represent the CSM; the refusal of contributions and community funding; television frequencies; the measures of the independent authorities (the dispute regarding unfair commercial practices by banks in applying the rules on the portability of real estate mortgages was very lively). Lastly, but only to highlight its particular importance, our commitment before the Court of Cassation, which hosts us today and with which we are honored to be able to work in full harmony: I like to point out the speed (a few days) with which it is the question concerning the admission of an electoral list was resolved during the last political elections. Before the Supreme Court, the dispute is particularly robust: almost 9,000 new business per year, of which 5,700 in tax matters. In this specific matter, the important recent sentence that defined the contours of the abuse of the right should be noted; and the very recent rulings which have reaffirmed, once again accepting the theses of the Avvocatura, the scope of the tax regime of banking foundations; and in procedural matters, the appropriate decision which, again on appeal by the Avvocatura, has put an end to the unjustified burden of notifying appeals in multiple copies even when the addressees are defended by the same defender. This commitment is flanked by that, often of considerable depth, of providing legal technical support to administrations, nationally and abroad, to guide their action: remember - by way of example - the continuation of the recovery of works art illegally left the territory of the State; initiatives for the recovery of a large quantity of gold contained in a warship sunk in international waters during the First World War; the well-known recent story of the extradition of Cesare Battisti from Brazil; the thorny question of the limits of Italian jurisdiction vis-à-vis foreign states. To this amount of work (perhaps not very well known to the general public) which I believe to be fruitful both for the correctness of the administrative action and for the state coffers (the entire Advocacy has a very low cost and the percentage of victory in the cases is of about the 2 new causes) but the problem has already been widely discussed. I conclude by drawing inspiration from the words of the Head of State in his speech to the Italians at the end of the year. The State Attorney's Office does not feel discouraged by the difficulties it encounters, by the objective very heavy situation of the economy and by the problems facing justice. In difficulties we can and must find the strength to recover and rise again (as has already happened in even more troubled times). A more just Italy can actually emerge from the crisis. Thank you, Mr. President of the Republic, thank you all for listening to me.