The government wants to adopt a law on freedom of information this fall that will abolish official secrecy. A working draft has now been leaked stating that communities with fewer than 10,000 inhabitants should be exempt from this. In 2006, these are municipalities in Austria with more than 4.7 million inhabitants – meaning that freedom of information would not apply to about half of the population.
There has been a long-running battle over the long-heralded Freedom of Information Act. Municipalities should be obliged to automatically make information available to their citizens. There was often resistance from states and communities who feared that governance would be overwhelmed and collapse.
Extended exceptions
The ÖVP, which has numerous mayors across Austria, has repeatedly raised these concerns, and the result appears to be a compromise with extensive exceptions, as the Ö1 “Morgenjournal” reports. “Municipalities with fewer than 10,000 inhabitants are not obliged to publish,” says a working draft from July 2023. These municipalities “may” publish information “in accordance with this provision,” Ö1 quotes from the draft.
This means that only 87 municipalities across Austria would have to release all information relevant to the public on their own initiative. Mathias Huter of the Freedom of Information Forum does not believe in such exceptions: “A significant part of the population would be less able to control decision-makers at the local level” and would have less access to information than residents of larger cities. Austria would therefore remain at the bottom in terms of transparency, according to Huter.
Constitutional lawyer Heinz Mayer considers the draft a slander: “This is a sign that we do not want to abolish official secrecy. It’s a sacred cow and you want to take good care of it, because you’ve clearly made a good living from it.” Mayer sees a “retreat”: Because most communities in Austria are very small. If only communities with fewer than 5,000 inhabitants were exempted, the publication obligation for 1819 would still not apply.
“One deception after another”
Mayer, who is also the initiator of the anti-corruption referendum, believes that it is better to have no freedom of information law at all than a law with so many exceptions. “It is better to leave the issue alone and admit that it is not working,” says the constitutional lawyer of the turquoise green government. “That would be fair. But what is being attempted now is one deception after another.”
The office of the responsible constitutional minister Karoline Edtstadler (ÖVP) did not want to comment on the work draft. It was simply emphasized that the abolition of official secrecy was a “paradigm change”. They are “in the final stages” of developing a new design together with the Greens.
Source: Krone
I am Ida Scott, a journalist and content author with a passion for uncovering the truth. I have been writing professionally for Today Times Live since 2020 and specialize in political news. My career began when I was just 17; I had already developed a knack for research and an eye for detail which made me stand out from my peers.
