20 Demands on the future of access to EU documents: Campaign Update

Madrid, 25 March 2012 - Since the 20 demands on the future of the EU access to documents Regulation were launched for civil society sign-on on 7 March 2012, 3 European Information Commissioners, 67 Non-governmental organisations and 6 Civil Society Coalitions representing 249 organisations have joined the campaign.

Click here to download the 20 demands on the future of EU transparency.

The 20 demands are presented to the Member State representatives working on the revision of the EU access to documents Regulation before each of their inter-governmental meetings at the Working Party on Information (WPI).

The Danish Presidency aims to get an agreement on the Regulation before the end of June, so the Working Party on Information will be meeting every two weeks to try and reach a common Council position on the future of the EU access to documents Regulation. Word has it that some Member States are resistant to the Parliament's proposals to improve the right of access to EU documents as recognised in the EU Treaties, and are actively supporting proposals to, inter alia, strengthen the Member States' abilities to veto release of documents produced by them, exclude legal advice from the scope of the Regulation, and restrict the definition of a document.

Read more...

New website launched to track access to information requests in Spain

Madrid, 22 March 2012 – As of today people in Spain will be able to make and track requests for Information from public bodies in a simple and free way via the new web portal TuDerechoaSaber.es (“Your right to know”) being launched by human rights organisations Access Info Europe and Fundación Ciudadana Civio. Based on mySociety’s Alaveteli software which also runs AsktheEU.org and Whatdotheyknow.com (UK), this pioneering website is being launched in the expectation that the Spanish government will adopt and access to information law during the first half of 2012.                                   

“The website tuderechoasaber.es aims to breach the wall of silence between the administration and the public. It will make it easy to ask about current topics such as cuts in public services or the debts of political parties,” said Victoria Anderica, Campaigner and Project Coordinator with Access Info Europe. “With tuderechoasaber.es asking for such Information is as easy as sending an e-mail.”

Spain is the only EU country with over one million inhabitants with no access to information law and research shows that over one in two requests (54%) never get any kind of response, while only 20% receive the information requested.

Read more...

EU Transparency

Campaign on the reform of EU access to documents Regulation

Access Info Europe is calling for civil society support for the campaign on the reform of the EU access to documents Regulation, which aims to strengthen the right of access to EU documents or, at the very least, to avoid any narrowing of the current right of access to documents.

Access Info Europe has prepared a briefing paper setting out the key points where reform of Regulation 1049 is necessary to bring it into line with the TFEU and international standards on the right of access to information, now that the reform process appears to be moving again.     

We are calling on all members of civil society to add their support by signing on to 20 civil society demands for the reform of the EU access to documents regulation. Please email Anne Vandelle with the name of your organisation, the name of its representative, and your logo at anne @ access-info.org as soon as possible.
- To date (8 March), 30 organisations have joined the campaign: 

Read more...