The Catalan Ombudsman has presented the second Annual report on transparència, access to public information and good governance. After delivering the document to the President of the Parliament, Carme Forcadell, Rafael Ribó made public the main conclusions and recommendations included in the Report.
One of the most notable conclusions was the high number of requests for access to information received in 2016, which was obtained from the answers provided by the evaluated administrations. According to the responses, 9.127 applications were registered, three times more than the previous evaluation. This figure places Catalonia in a similar ratio of applications to countries where the right of access to information has been recognized for many years.
This essential democratic right means that it must receive preferential attention from the administrations. The high percentage of non-response (measured from a sample of queries made anonymously according to the method known as the "hidden citizen") indicates that this is not yet the case. Thus, out of 175 requests sent, 53 have remained unanswered.
In terms of active advertising, the report has analyzed more than 2.400 web portals between administrations and other obliged entities. Despite this disparity, it is observed that larger administrations tend to maintain and improve the results of the previous year in terms of published information. The improvement has been more significant in small administrations, which in the initial period showed more precarious compliance. It should be noted that globally 9 out of 10 portals use the solution provided by the AOC.
In terms of the quality and format of the information, the analysis of the portals reflects, in general terms, substantial deficiencies in compliance with the legal criteria for updating and clarity of information and reuse of published data.
With regard to the number of entries in the Register of Stakeholders, it has also increased exponentially, from almost 100 in the first report to close to 2.000 last May.
With regard to the obligations of good governance, the report highlights significant advances in the development of codes of conduct and much more limited in terms of the development of service charters adapted to the law and regulatory quality.
The Report also highlights that the regulatory implementation of Law 19/2014 is pending to specify its scope and obligations, although work has begun to make this implementation effective.
A total of 251 town councils and 3 county councils did not answer the Catalan Ombudsman's questionnaire in order to draw up the report, and 53 out of a total of 175 did not reply to a request for access to information made incognito. You can check thecomplete report and attached documents.
