Freedom of information law in German Parliament

The German Parliament (Bundestag) has completed the first reading of a new freedom of information law on 17 December 2004. Germany and Switzerland are the only 2 major Western European member states of the Council of Europe without such a law on accessibility of governmental acts and decision making. Within the EU, only Cyprus, Malta and Luxemburg lack this kind of legislation. The German green-red coalition cabinet promised to send such a proposal to the Lower House immediately after the summer recess. In a joint press release, the data protection authorities of Schleswig-Holstein, Berlin, Brandenburg and Nordrhein-Westfalen call the proposal 'a step in the right direction', but at the same time say the proposal 'shows the skid marks of numerous compromises'. Documents containing company secrets can only be made available, even if the company agrees, if there is an exceptional public interest. In general, the data protection authorities complain there are too many restrictions in the law. EDRI-gram reported earlier that a freedom of information law was already announced in 1998, in the coalition agreement between the Social Democrat Party (SPD) and the Greens. The project was stalled many times, until the national ministry of the interior released a half-hearted discussion draft in the summer of 2001. This legal proposal was rejected in June 2002, due to party-political disagreement. http://www.datenschutzzentrum.de/material/themen/presse/20041217-ifg.htm