The Transparency Laws (Law 19/2013 and Catalan Law 19/2014) establish the need for the Public Administrations (AAPP) to create their transparency portals as a tool to make available to the public the active advertising data they provide. This data, in accordance with the Laws, must be published periodically, permanently updated, provided and published in a structured way in order to facilitate its identification and research.

Despite these forecasts, the practice has shown on many occasions that although most public organizations are complying with the provisions of the Transparency Laws, this has not meant achieving a good level of public transparency, given that that in some cases updating the data is an organizational effort that has not been properly planned, and that has led to these portals being publishing notoriously obsolete data.

Obviously, as long as it is feasible, the best solution to keep the transparency portals permanently up to date will be to automate the active advertising data from the beginning, ie the automated extraction of the indicators from the same administrative file that generates them.

Otherwise, one of the causes of these dysfunctions can be found, most likely, in which some public organizations have not been able to internalize the change of culture that involves the opening of public data in its entirety.

In this sense, in order to reinforce the transition to this paradigm shift that the culture of transparency implies and that it permeates the whole organization, it is recommended that the obligations of the Transparency Laws regarding the information that is published, s 'incardinate in the normative body of each organization.

One possible solution would be to approve an active advertising indicator update guide within the organization, where you could take the opportunity to incorporate other indicators that the organization needs to update on a regular basis.

Specifically, this guide should provide for each indicator, both the responsibilities and the frequency of its updating, also indicating whether it is intended to be more comprehensive, what are the individual limits at the time of publication.

Legal Context

Law 19/2014, of 29 December, on transparency, access to public information and good governance :

Article 6. Obligations of transparency

"1. In order to give effect to the principle of transparency, the obligated parties must take the following actions:

a) Disseminate public information of general interest in a truthful and objective manner, so that people can know the action and operation of the Public Administration and exercise control over this action.

b) Ensure that the information referred to in letter a is constantly disseminated and constantly updated, with the express indication of the date on which it was last updated and, if possible, of the date on which it was updated. 'needs to update again.

c) To organize the information in such a way that it is easily accessible and comprehensible to the people and that it facilitates an agile and fast consultation by means of search instruments equipped with the technical characteristics that guarantee it.

d) Arrange the information thematically so that it is easy and intuitive to locate. This arrangement must be made, at least, with thematic and chronological criteria, following the comparative document classification table ―if available― and incorporating indexes or reference guides.

e) Facilitate the consultation of information with the use of computer media in formats that are easily understood and that allow interoperability and reuse. ”

Related Solutions

Transparency :

Transparency portal for local bodies

Transparency open data repository of local bodies in Catalonia

Models, guides and good practices