Reports on Transparency in the European Union

The Secret State of EU Transparency Reforms

This report came out of Access Info’s litigation with the Council of the European Union at the General Court of the EU (Case T-233/09). We had asked for documents showing what was being debated during the reform process of EU Regulation 1049/2001 on access to Parliament, Council and Commission documents. The Council replied giving us some information, but nothing that would allow us to identify who was saying what behind the Brussels doors. So we set about asking each EU Member State instead. The Secret State of EU Transparency Reforms reveals that 16 of the 27 Member States refuse to provide information on their negotiating positions on the EU transparency law

Question to Brussels: How should a citizen request EU documents?

2009 – Access Info filed access to information requests with the 16 Directorate Generals of the European Union. The aim was to monitor whether or not their internal guidelines on answering information requests were of a good enough standard.
The findings of Access Info’s research, published in the report “Question to Brussels: How should a citizen request EU documents?” include poor document management and a serious barrier to access posed by languages; not to mention the fact that half of the DGs didn’t even have internal guidelines. Read more…