University lawyer congress: ‘Do not view an Open Government Act request as a threat‘

“We have gathered together as lawyers. That’s good from time to time.” While Manon Polak, in her role as Director of Legal Services at TU Delft, welcomes the attendees, the last ones enter the glasshouse in The Green Village. About 120 people came to this second annual congress of the Lawyers Consultation Committee. They work in the legal departments of Dutch universities and came to Delft for a morning of readings and an afternoon of workshops in small groups.

TU Delft’s Legal Services department put the programme together with current subjects, explains Polak. It covers several topics among which are the Open Government Act (Wet Open Overheid or WOO) and the Artificial Intelligence Act that was recently introduced in Europe. The subject of social safety is also addressed. “It has not escaped everyone’s attention that this is an important current issue at TU Delft,” says Polak. While she also believes “that this is also relevant at other universities”, she wants to share some insights from TU Delft. “Speed and diligence do not always match, but we are try to do the right thing in the process.”

Transparency in a glasshouse

After another welcome by the Director of The Green Village, the congress starts with a reading by Lydia Bremmer, the Secretary Director of the Advisory Board on Open Government and Information Management (ACOI). She says that she has never talked about openness and the Open Government Act in such a fitting location. “This building is literally transparent.”

The feeling of ‘Yes to the WOO’ does not appear to be felt by anyone

The ACOI, that was created in September 2022, is familiar to the universities. Of the 21 mediation cases that the Advisory Board has handled to date, three concerned a WOO request to a university.

In one case, the mediation between the Nieuwsuur (a televised news programme) journalist Siebe Sietsma and TU Delft a year ago led to critical recommendations (in Dutch). In its recommendations the ACOI wrote about its impressions that ‘the implementation and good execution of the WOO … was not automatically a top priority for TU Delft.’

The fact that the WOO is not appreciated equally by everyone a year later becomes clear when Bremmer asks the attendees if any of them have ‘mostly negative’ feelings towards it. A few dozen confirm this. In contrast, the feeling of ‘Yes to the WOO’ does not appear to be felt by anyone. Bremmer sees this as encouraging, she says, in convincing her audience about the importance of the Act.

‘Government information is for everyone’

Bremmer has some recommendations for the lawyers based on patterns that she sees in ACOI cases. Firstly, “Government information does not belong to Government, but to the people.” She strongly encourages the lawyers to keep as little information confidential as possible. “The Open Government Act says ‘open unless’. Keep this adage in mind.”

Secondly, she advises the audience to put the end user at the centre of their work. “Do not view a WOO request as a threat,” says Bremmer, but as an “invitation for cooperation” to give clarity on a certain subject. Thirdly, start with a conversation, “preferably with a cup of coffee”. According to her, if an organisation properly probes the requester, both can focus the request together.

Rancour

At the same time, Bremmer recognises that not every person submitting a request is open for a conversation like this. She sees more and more WOO requests being submitted because of ‘rancour, financial gain or to get information in battles with neighbours or employers’. While the law states that only those submitting WOO requests that have ‘a professional interest’ (such as academics and journalists) can approach the ACOI for mediation, she also advises those dealing with these cases to contact them if they come up against a difficult request. “We have good people, a lot of knowledge, and we can always see what we can do for you.”

Independent complaints committee

The next day, Friday 15 November, the fact that the contact around WOO requests does not always go satisfactorily for all sides, was made even clearer. The first hearing in handling a complaint against TU Delft’s Legal Services department was then done.

The complaint focusses on the way in which TU Delft dealt with various WOO requests from a complainant. While it could have been handled internally, TU Delft took the decision to set up an independent committee for this complaint.

The committee is now tasked with looking into what it believes happened in the run-up to the complaint. In doing so, it is arranging at least two hearings to ask the complainant and TU Delft about their respective sides of the story. The committee can also listen to witnesses if one side puts them forward. When the committee feels that it has enough information, it will close its work with a report of its findings and a recommendation to the Executive Board.

Delta was invited by the complainant to attend the first hearing in which the complainant was heard by the committee. Delta submitted a request to the committee to also be admitted to the next hearings in order to be able to report fairly.