- Change in the legal basis, so that in principle no fees are charged for access to official documents.
- Exception: only justified fees in the case of disproportionate administrative costs in relation to the public interest.
parl. Initiative Graf-Litscher (16.432): Fee regulation. Principle of publicity in the federal administration
Not yet discussed in the Council
Submitted text
Based on Article 160 paragraph 1 of the Federal Constitution and Article 107 of the Parliamentary Act, I submit the following parliamentary initiative:
The legal basis should be changed so that, as a rule, no fee is charged for access to official documents, and that only in justified exceptional cases, when the effort of the administration is not in reasonable proportion to the public interest, a fee is charged for access to official documents.
Justification
Since the Federal Law on the Principle of Publicity of the Administration (BGÖ) has been in force, the charging of fees has been a frequent point of contention. In the past, individual administrative units have demanded deterringly high fees. In connection with the Duro procurement, for example, a citizens’ group would have had to pay the Federal Office of Armaments (armasuisse) 7900 francs just for checking access to the files. A noise protection association was offered the prospect of a bill of 16,500 francs for access to a 90-page report. Media representatives were also confronted with sometimes exorbitant fee demands.
Fees have only been demanded by a few administrative bodies in the past. In 97 percent of the requests reported to the Federal Data Protection and Information Commissioner (FDPIC) in the 2014/2015 reporting year, no fees were collected. The federal administration collected only 2600 francs in 2015 and 6502.50 francs and 6300 francs in the years before. Quite obviously, fees are deliberately used by some administrative bodies as a barrier to access, which is contrary to the spirit of the Public Access Act. Citizens or media representatives confronted with such high access fees usually withdraw their applications. In fee disputes brought before the FDPIC’s arbitration board, the Federal Administrative Court or the Federal Supreme Court, the administration has repeatedly been criticized for this.
If the administration is confronted with a very extensive access request that is based on a low public interest, it may exceptionally assert a justified claim for fees and thus maintain proportionality.