Renato Giuseppe Schifani was born in Palermo on 11 May 1950. He is married with Mrs. Franca and has two sons, Roberto, a lawyer, and Andrea, a university student.

EDUCATION AND PROFESSION

He got first-class Scientific Secondary School certificate in 1968, studied Law with great passion and graduated summa cum laude in 1973, and was admitted to the Bar in 1976.
At the beginning of his career, he exclusively worked as a civil lawyer in both contentious and extra-judicial sectors, also performing the function of receiver.
He registered in the Roll of Auditors and worked in that role in lesser national public institutions.
He also fulfilled the function of Commissioner entrusted by the Government with supervising state-subsidised legal entities.
He was appointed Arbitrator by the President of the Palermo Court.
In some cases, he had to act in criminal proceedings in relation to their administrative or civil aspects.
Over time, he specialised in administrative litigation, with special reference to companies and industries in the construction sector, and, in 1992, being an expert on the subject of urban development, was appointed member of the Urban Planning Commission by the Council of the Bar of Palermo.
He was appointed trustee in bankruptcy for important companies and also fulfilled tasks of judicial custody.
From the Nineties onwards, his law firm has become renowned for its excellence urban development law, with special reference to administrative aspects.
In that period, he provided civil and administrative legal aid to important private and public companies and banking groups and was also advisor to the Palermo Association of Engineers in urban development matters, as well as advisor in urban development law to some municipalities in the province of Palermo as far as the administrative aspects were concerned.
Finally, he became lawyer at major courts.

POLITICAL CAREER

He joined "Forza Italia" in 1995, having regional-level responsibility for the Party's Departments.
The following year, he was elected Senator and from then on he has put all his efforts into his political activity.
In the 13th Parliament (1996-2001), he served as Party Leader in the Constitutional Affairs Committee and was member of the Two-Chamber Constitutional Reform Committee, also known as "The Bicameral Committee".
Moreover, he was member of the Labour Committee, the EU Policies Committee and the Two-Chamber Schengen, Europol and Immigration Committee.
In the same Parliament, he was the first signer of many bills, among which one intended to cover the legal expenses incurred by injured parties and municipalities associated with the public prosecutor in organised crime or terrorism cases.
He was appointed Minority Rapporteur to the Plenary on the so-called 'Par Condicio' Bill (a bill intended to assign a proper visibility to all the most important political parties and movements).
He took the floor 212 times in the Committees and 80 times in plenary sittings.
In the 14th Parliament (2001-2006), he was elected Leader of the "Forza Italia" Parliamentary Group.
He was member of the Agriculture Committee and the Select Committee on Rules.
In the 14th Parliament, he was first signer of many bills, among which the bill on the use of funds for the UN Conference on Organised Crime (Act 436 of 20 November 2001) and the bill to modify the rules for the management and final use of seized or forfeited properties.
In 2002, he was a protagonist in the attempt to secure the embedding as a definitive measure in our criminal code of the provisional extraordinary prison regime under Article 41-bis (particularly strict imprisonment conditions for mafia criminals).
In his capacity as Parliamentary Group Leader, he took the floor 135 times in plenary sittings.
He continued to serve in that capacity in the 15th Parliament (2006-2008) and was simultaneously member of the Environment Committee.
He tabled the Sexual Assault Bill as first signer.
In his capacity as Parliamentary Group Leader, he took the floor 114 times in plenary sittings.
On 28 April 2008, in the 16th Parliament, he was elected President of the Italian Senate in the first ballot with 178 votes.