Dialogue for Hungary welcomes the opinion of Attila Péterfalvi, head of the data protection authority, that rejects the secrecy of the Paks-law: the green party believes that there are too many secrets surrounding the investment. We call on the government to revise its unsustainable stance and we filed a complaint to the European Commission, as the exclusion of publicity violates EU law as well.
In his opinion Attila Péterfalvi made it clear that the Paks law, affecting all data and preparatory documents and denying the access to public data is not compliant with the Hungarian legislation’s regulations on the publicity of public money and public data. According to Dialogue for Hungary the Orbán government, too, will have to take steps at this point. If even members from the innermost circle of trust of the government, as Péterfalvi, say that the secrecy is indefensible, it means that the law is not viable and will sooner or later fail at some higher level of our juristic system.
Another thing that became clear at the hearing about the expansion project in the European Parliament is that the European Commission, as well, urges as much transparency as possible. The new developments are shameful both for the government that proposed, and to János Áder, who as President of Hungary, signed the law. They both ignored the content of our fundamental laws and EU legislation on the publicity of public data. It is high time for the supervision of the law that contradicts both Hungarian and European legislation. Dialogue for Hungary seeks to quicken this procedure through its own means; therefore, we filed a complaint to the European Commission about the law that goes against EU directives.
Benedek Jávor, Member of the European Parliament
March 19, 2015
Brussels-Budapest