Strasbourg, Palais de l’Europe, Room 2
Bullet points for opening of the workshop by General Director Gianluca Esposito
Welcome members of the Council of Europe Access Info Group, the Committee of Convention 108 and GRECO, as well as independent experts.
Welcome the initiative of this workshop as a good practice of transversal dialogue and co-operation in the Council of Europe.
This facilitates our common understanding of challenges to the protection of privacy and to the strengthening of transparency of our public administrations.
It also renders our voice more coherent and stronger.
The Secretary General of the Council of Europe has launched a New Democratic Pact for Europe.
Its goals are: to confront democratic backsliding; to resist polarisation in our societies; and to restore people’s trust in democratic institutions by making it tangible for their daily lives.
It will be one of our Organisation’s responses to the multiple challenges that our societies are facing, including to our collective security.
As our Secretary General repeatedly underlines – we must speak not only of military security, but also of democratic security.
The values that you are defending in each of your monitoring bodies are indicators of democratic security and good governance.
Transparency of public authorities is fundamental to good governance.
A society’s commitment to transparency and anti-corruption efforts serves as an indicator of its democratic strength and resilience. Transparency empowers citizens to hold those in power accountable, openly criticise governance and engage meaningfully in the decision-making process.
In short, transparency reinforces their legitimacy in the eyes of the public and its confidence in them.
The right to privacy as an enabling right plays a crucial role in the enjoyment of other rights enshrined in the ECHR
The responsible processing of personal data is also an important indicator of good governance and of the overall state of democracy in a country.
But the protection of privacy cannot serve to cover up corruption, bad management or poor public administration. As the European Court of Human Rights has stated, the right to privacy should be balanced against other rights in the Convention, notably the freedom of expression, for the purpose of transparency, participatory processes and democratic debates.
This event is a perfect forum to start discussing this balancing exercise.
The voices of your monitoring bodies are very important in this context.
Transversal dialogues such as this one are necessary to help the Council of Europe monitoring bodies to ensure accuracy, balance, and coherency in their monitoring work.
The theme that you have chosen to debate in this workshop – the intersection between privacy and the transparency of the public administration – shows that you care about getting the balance right.
Invite the TP-D, the AIG and GRECO to view themselves as integral parts of a collaborative community of Council of Europe monitoring bodies, working in an integrated manner towards a shared goal. Each brings unique perspectives and expertise that ensures high quality outcomes, while respecting their distinct mandates and responsibilities.
By promoting coherence in communication with members or State Parties, and aligning messages strategically, all three bodies can ensure that their distinct approaches not only complement and reinforce each other’s work but also present a unified front that enhances impact and credibility in advancing integrity, transparency, and respect for privacy.
The Tromsø Convention now has 17 Parties. All of them are Council of Europe member States.
They represent diverse legal cultures, from the Nordic European countries which have a long-standing legal tradition of openness, to states from eastern and central Europe with recent access to information laws, generally modelled after the Convention.
We have come a long way from December 2020 when the Convention entered into force upon its ratification by its 10th State Party.
When the Convention was drafted, the consensus was that it should contain basic obligations reflecting what was already accepted in existing national laws and could also be accepted and implemented by States that lacked such laws.
This flexibility built into the Tromsø Convention is one of its strengths.
It is reflected in the results of the monitoring mechanism of the Convention.
TP-D has more members and observers who can, where appropriate and within their roles, encourage more ratifications of the Tromsø Convention.
For example, in many countries the responsibility for ensuring personal data protection and access to official documents lies with the same authority. These authorities are our natural allies for promoting the ratification of the Tromsø Convention.
Whenever relevant, GRECO has consistently recommended that member states which have not yet done so should ratify the Tromsø Convention, acknowledging its unique value and role in promoting transparency and integrity in public administration. This complementary approach reinforces collective efforts and offers a promising path forward.
Wish to the participants good discussions.
