The Slovenian National Assembly March 6 unanimously voted to extend freedom of information disclosure requirements to state- and municipality-owned firms, according to Slovenian Press Agency report.
An amendment to make public all non-performing loans at state banks was defeated.
Senior executives of state-owned companies lobbied strongly against the proposed changes to the Access to Public Information Act (APIA).
Under the amended APIA, companies and other private law entities which are under direct or indirect dominant influence of the government, local authorities or other public law entities, will be obliged to provide public sector information.
An entity is considered to be under dominant influence when the government or other public law entity either owns share capital, has the right to appoint more than half of the executive or supervisory board members, or can in any other way enforce its management rights, according to a summary from the Slovenian Information Commissioner’s office.
Large companies owned by the government, but not performing public powers or public services (e.g. companies providing telecommunication services, insurance services, certain banks etc.) also will be covered by the APIA.
More Datasets to Be Public
In addition, public bodies and other entities obliged to provide public sector information, will have to proactively publish data on all their contracts.
Data will be collected centrally and will be published on a common portal.
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