The newspaper El País takes stock of the 10 years of the Catalan Transparency Law highlighting the work done by the AOC

The newspaper El País publishes the article "Catalan transparency law: a decade, two speeds", with the participation of several experts who highlight the work carried out by the AOC Consortium. Let's summarize the article, adding the AOC's view of this stage:

Cultural change

The Law represented a turning point in the organizational culture of public servants, emphasizing the dissemination of data and the facilitation of citizen access to information. As a result of the demands of the European Commission and public pressure, the right of citizens to have access to information of public interest was regulated for the first time in line with international standards.

A decade of progress

The law is ten years old, with a generally positive balance sheet.

an enormous effort has been made to open up information: all Catalan administrations have a transparency portal and publish open data from the main areas of public management.
the article says that "The experts agree to praise the work done by the AOC to make available to all entities the tools to meet the requirements."
the Open Governments Network has been an excellent example of collaboration between the Generalitat, the local world and the AOC. Thanks to their work, the level of compliance of local administrations in Catalonia is twice that of the rest of Spain.
la GAIP – Commission for Guaranteeing the Right of Access to Public Information it has worked very well as an agile, efficient and cost-free conflict mediator, despite limitations.

Gap between Administrations

The Law demands the same requirements for the Gisclareny City Council with 30 inhabitants as in Barcelona, and this is neither feasible nor realistic. This is one of the weaknesses of the Law that causes a huge difference in compliance between large and small municipalities.

Pending challenges

During these 10 years of practical application of the Law there are many learnings that we must take into account. Some highlights are:

it is necessary to lower the level of demand on small entities or provide many more supra-municipal resources to support them.
an effective sanctioning regime is needed: in 10 years there has been no sanction (or almost none), despite breaches.
the Commission for Guaranteeing the Right to Public Information must be strengthened. It has worked very well and I could do more work with more resources, more skills and more autonomy.
it is necessary to strengthen the transparency of activities with interest groups that influence public policies.
anonymous access right requests must be allowed
it is necessary to promote the openness of relevant data, especially in the areas that allow the quality of public services to be evaluated.
it is necessary to promote transparency by default, automating the publication of information on transparency portals from the systematic opening of information system data.
and the deployment of citizen participation processes in all administrations is necessary.

More information:

> Article from El País: https://elpais.com/espana/catalunya/2024-12-29/ley-catalana-de-transparencia-una-decada-dos-velocidades.html
> Conference "10 years of Law 19/2014, on transparency, access to public information and good governance"