Activities of Marco CAPPATO related to 2007/2154(INI)
Plenary speeches (2)
Public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents (debate)
Public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents (debate)
Reports (1)
REPORT Report on public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents (implementation of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001) PDF (159 KB) DOC (86 KB)
Amendments (18)
Amendment 1 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 4
Citation 4
– having regard to Articles 10 and 16 of the Treaty on European Union as it is due to be amended by the Treaty of Lisbon and to Articles 15 and 298 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union,
Amendment 2 #
Motion for a resolution
Citation 6 a (new)]
Citation 6 a (new)]
- having regard to Council Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 1700/2003 of 22 September 2003 amending Regulation (EEC, Euratom) No 354/83 concerning the opening to the public of the historical archives of the European Economic Community and the European Atomic Energy Community1
Amendment 3 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E
Recital E
E. whereas the Council does not systematically inserts the legislative procedure references in its documentsinterinstitutional reference number only in a limited number of documents, contrary to Article 11(2) of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001, thereby making it difficult to associate a document with a procedure, while it also either downgrades documents to "sessionroom documents" that are not registered, or treats them as "diplomatic" documents, hereby nullifying citizens' right of access to documents,
Amendment 4 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E a (new)
Recital E a (new)
Ea. whereas according to Recital 6 of Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001, access should also be granted to documents produced under the delegated powers procedure (comitology) and whereas nine tenths of the legislation produced is adopted under that procedure, and, accordingly, proper and transparent Parliamentary and democratic scrutiny should be fully guaranteed within that framework,
Amendment 5 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Urgently calls on all EU institutions to apply Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 in the light of the recent case-law and notably of the Turco case in all its implications, notably in the legislative proceedings (publication of legal service opinions, strict interpretation of exceptions, obligation to provide a detailed statement of reasons for refusal, etc) and calls on the Council also to review its rules to ensure publicity of all discussions, documents and information, including the identity of the Member States’ delegations in the Council, as well as in its working groups and expert groups, and to draw up a transcript of its public meetings, since the ECJ conclusions concerning the fact that the exception on the protection of the decision-making process is outweighed by the public interest in openness - as different views on a legislative act allow for a greater legitimacy for the institutions - apply also in this case;
Amendment 6 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3 a (new)]
Paragraph 3 a (new)]
3a. Calls on the EU institutions to define common rules on the way in which administrative procedures should be carried out and administrative documents should be tabled, classified ,declassified, registered and disseminated inside and outside the institutions, bearing in mind that the transparency principle is indissociable from the principle of good administration as proclaimed by the European Parliament, Council and Commission in Article 41 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union; in the same perspective, Regulation (EEC, Euratom) No 354/83 should be merged as part of the revision of Regulation 1049/2001 to include definitions of common rules on live, intermediate and historical archives in order to avoid the current inconsistencies between the practices of the EU institutions and the Member States;
Amendment 7 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 4
Paragraph 4
4. Believes that Parliament should be at the forefront of publicity, transparency and openness in the EU, and that before the Parliamentary elections of 2009, it should launch an extraordinary action plan , for instance within the framework of the e- Parliament initiative, to ensure that more and easily accessible information is made available, notably on its website, on: -MEPs' activities, participation in and attendance at Parliamentary works, in absolute, relative and % terms, available and accessible to citizens also through search criteria1, 1 Such as: how many days each MEP has been present in the EP and where he has signed and/or voted, as well how when roll call votes take place,-Parliament's activities in plenary and in, committee; to which institutional bodies' meetings he has participated, plenary and/or committee and/or delegation, etc; data should be available also through search criteria, such as name of the MEP / plenary /, delegations and internal bodies: the Legislative Observatory should be improved by including references and links to all relevant documents1; committee /and delegation / votes / presence / day / month / year / legislative term / etc, and links to this webpage should be included in MEPs webpages and in other relevant websites; MEPs webpages should include this information as well as the name of the assistants, opinions made, amendments tabled in committee and plenary to reports and other acts, explanations of vote, audio-video interventions, written declarations signed, including the list of all signatories, etc; - Parliament's activities in plenary and committee: the Legislative Observatory should be improved by including references and links to all relevant documents1; committee works should be streamed on Parliament's website as plenary works are, and also recorded, and made available and accessible to citizens through search criteria,works should be streamed on Parliament's website as plenary works are, and also recorded, and made available and accessible to citizens through search criteria; internal bodies (such as the Conference of Presidents, the Bureau, the Quaestors, the Working Party on Parliamentary Reform, etc) should promote and ensure the highest level of transparency of their works vis-a-vis other members and citizens by making all their documents available; -MEPs' allowances and spending, in conformity with the position taken by the European Ombudsman in relation to the fact that access to information should apply also to such data2, as well as all declarations of financial interests for all MEPs, and that such information should be available in all EU official languages and calls on Member States, national parliaments as well as other elected bodies to do the same by establishing a Register of parliaments' and parliamentarians' activities;
Amendment 8 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 5 a (new)
Paragraph 5 a (new)
5a. Considers that retrieving documents and information would be easier if the documents themselves were tabled, registered and re-used by other legislative institutions in compliance with common standards (for instance for references to different version of the same document, its amendments, annexes and corrigenda)1 by using open-source word processors, effective multilingualism and technologies that also allow persons with disabilities to gain access to information and documents, as suggested by the Commission to the Member States in its Communication on interoperability solutions for European public administrations (ISA) (COM (2008)0583) and as provided for in Directive 2003/98/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 November 2003 on the re-use of public sector information2);
Amendment 9 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 5 b (new)
Paragraph 5 b (new)
Amendment 10 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 5 c (new)
Paragraph 5 c (new)
Amendment 11 #
Paragraph 7, indent 3 a (new)]
- all legislative proposals are accompanied by an impact assessment available to the public;
Amendment 12 #
Paragraph 8 a (new)
8a. Underlines the fact that the existing procedures for delegated legislation (the so-called "comitology acts") which cover nine tenths of the legally binding acts adopted every year by the EU institutions should be reviewed and applied in such a way as to ensure that democratic principles and transparency are guaranteed, that the members, proceedings and votes of the comitology committees should be made public and that national and European parliamentarians as well as citizens should have immediate access to the documents in comitology register as soon as they are sent to the members of comitology committees (as promised in 2001 by former Commissioner Barnier); considers that enhanced transparency should apply in particular to draft regulations, while Parliament should organise the processing of such proposals in the most open and transparent way, thereby avoiding opaque situations such as those which arose in connection with the regulations on aviation security on liquids and body scanners;
Amendment 13 #
Paragraph 10 a (new)
10a. Calls on the EU institutions and Member States to promote a common administrative culture of transparency founded on the principles outlined in Article 41 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union, by the case-law of the ECJ , the recommendations of the European Ombudsman and the best practices of the Member States; considers that, as is already the case for data protection officers, each Directorate General of the EU institutions should ensure that documents are tabled, registered, classified, declassified and disseminated consistently with the principle of good administration, Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 and the rules of procedure of the institutions concerned;
Amendment 14 #
Paragraph 10 b (new)
10b. Calls for the launch of a European Year of Transparency and for a European transparency campaign to be promoted in 2009 on the occasion of the European elections, so that citizens are aware of their rights of access to EU documents and of EU standards regarding publicity, openness and transparency, as well as in the Member States;
Amendment 15 #
Paragraph 10 c (new)
10c. Considers that transparency at EU level should be mirrored by Member States when transposing EU legislation into national law and invites national parliaments and Conference of Community and European Affairs Committees of Parliaments of the European Union to examine the proposals contained in this resolution and to promote an EU register of parliaments' and parliamentarians' activities which could serve to ensure and increase mutual cooperation and consultation between the EU, Parliament and national parliaments, drawing also on best practice in terms of e-Parliament and e-government transparency;
Amendment 16 #
Paragraph 10 d (new)
10d. Calls on political parties and parliamentary political groups to promote transparency and openness internally and in parliaments, for instance by broadcasting their meetings and making programmes and documents available on the Internet;
Amendment 17 #
Paragraph 10 e (new)
10e. Takes note of the concerns expressed with regard to the Draft Council of Europe Convention on Access to Official Documents by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe in its Opinion No. 270 (2008), and calls on Member States to include in the Draft Convention at least the amendments put forward by the members of that Assembly;
Amendment 18 #
Paragraph 10 f (new)
10f. Calls on the European Council and the ECJ(the latter as far as its administrative tasks are concerned, which are the only two bodies still not applying Regulation 1049/2001 to their documents, to reflect and to take appropriate action to remedy that situation;