Access to Information Programme | Information newsletter issue 11(23) November 2005

The Execution of Court Rulings Is Not a Problem in Holland
Roger Vleugels, independent

Roger Vleugels is a Dutch independent press-consultant focusing on news-gathering, source-management, tools and methods for investigative journalism and freedom of information. He provides consultancy on transparency. He is also one of the two editors of the biweekly Fringe Intelligence and monthly Fringe Spitting. The former focuses mainly on security- & secret services and intelligence; while the latter contains news and tools concerning newsgathering, remarkable disclosures and freedom of information in general.

Mr. Vleugels, what were your initial expectations about the conference?
My initial expectations were mostly to learn more about the volume, success rate and speed of FOI procedures in different countries. I was interested in the position of the freedom of information in political and civil society and in press climate. I wanted to know about the legal and formal aspects of freedom of information in different parts of Europe.

Were you surprised in some way from the way it went on or any of the outcomes? What precisely?
I am very surprised by a lot of aspects. Most of all by the one-dimensionality of a lot of aspects in FOI implementation and litigation.
Getting documents disclosed depends, in my opinion, more on tactics than on the FOI Act itself. Legal knowledge is of course needed, but that is only the first step. Most FOIAs are more or less comparable. As a matter of fact, I think that differences in the outcomes, in disclosures, are more the result of differences in approach, tactics, creativity, and political knowledge than of differences between FOIAs or legal systems. Furthermore, I am still in some kind of shock by the fact that lots of the participants looked at their parliament not solely as a public body but also as a government body. This way of thinking illustrates to me that the real meaning of trias politica or the fundamental basis of democracy is highly
absent. In fact, it smells a little bit as communism. A phenomenon of only historical importance I think. On the other hand, it shows clearly the importance of debates between East and West, or new school and old school.

Do you think that Western governments are more open and accountable in principle? We have been reassured that people do not use WOB in the Netherlands because free access to information is in the habit of the administrations' work. You, however, have been using WOB for 15 years to find and demonstrate the flaws in the system. Can you tell me three general FOI problems that emerged to be similar in Eastern and Western Europe during the two days discussions?

For me it is not clear enough to say that Western governments are more open.
At the conference, we did not speak about the percentage of active transparency; we also did not compare figures. We only talked about freedom of information, which is passive transparency. The Wob in The Netherlands is very needed for press, researchers, publicists, and also for NGO's to disclose documents. The Dutch government is in the West an average secretive government, as secretive as, for instance US and UK, and more secretive than Scandinavian countries and Canada.
I use the Wob since the late 80's. In total, I filed for my clients more than 2,000 requests. About 33% on intelligence related documents, my specialty; the rest mainly for the press on all kinds of subjects. Prominent in this second group are disclosures of documents of inspectorates, government watchdogs, on fraud and misuse of taxpayers’ money, and so on.
Most of the discussed problems are manifest in East and West, like the broad and vague exemptions; misuse of exemptions; absence of penalties; government opportunism; greater reach for the state security exemption; and so on.

There are also major differences, like not executing court rulings. A problem in the East, never seen in Holland. You have told us stories about how WOB could be efficiently implemented in the Netherlands. What lesson (if any) have you learned from Eastern European and Asian countries about the implementation of FOIA?

The initial implementation of the WOB was 25 years ago. Unfortunately, due to the political consensus tradition in The Netherlands the volume of requests yearly filed sticks at about 1000 a year on federal level. I have learned no direct lessons on this subject. Interesting were the singling differences between the East and the West. For instance: most of the requests in The Netherlands are filed by the press and only very few by NGO's. In the Balkans, very few by the press and a lot by NGO's. Or a difference in a more abstract approach. In my eyes, but this needs a lot more contact and debate to understand this in full, there are major differences in the position of FOI in the East and the West. In Holland, it is an institutionalised instrument, one of the tools for investigative research. Disclosing docs is a regular occurring phenomenon in civil society. In the East, it is first of all a movement or a part of a movement towards a more open society. This topic is also in Holland a topic, including data protection and so on, but it is organised in another way. These differences are very interesting. We all can learn a lot, for years and years to come. Important will be to learn more about each other culture, laws and practice
in a very practical case and country related sense.