The right to access to public information in the  verdicts of administrative courts

The access to public information plays very important role in democratic society. He provides access to information about very important public matters, about activities of organs of public authority, public duties. The right to access to public information has been developed in Polen as a constitutional right only to the Constitution in 1997. Until the adoption and entry into force of the Act on access to public information, the Article 61 of Constitution was basic regulation which guaranteed access to public information. The right to access to public information was and is still developed in the verdicts of administrative courts. The administrative courts played very important role in configuration limits of protection this right.

The adoption of the UE Directive on Open Data and Re-use of Public Sector Information gives rise to necessity of its implementation by the Member States of the European Union. The process of implementing the Directive in Poland has also a significant constitutional value, because - according to the authors of this article - its content is realization of the principle of the common good (Article 1 of the Constitution of the Republic of Poland: “The Republic of Poland shall be the common good of all its citizens”). This is because data sharing has not only economic value, allowing the entity using access to public information to achieve a financial benefit, but also in other areas, where, in principle, both parties (a person and public authority) benefit from such action. Therefore, the role of public authorities should be to ensure the widest possible access to public sector information in order to implement the constitutional principle of the common good.

Access to public information in Poland is most typically discussed in the legal and political contexts. However, it is not consciously discussed as a possibility for political scholars to exercise their right of access to public information. This paper, which is of postulatory nature, identifies the benefits for those political scholars who decide to use, in the process of data collection, their right of access to public information as a data collection technique. The proposed technic of data collection may be used by scholars – political scientists around the world.

Gloss to the Judgment of the Supreme Administrative Court of 7 April 2022, file ref. no. III OSK 4374/21

In the commented judgment, the Supreme Administrative Court (hereinafter: the Supreme Administrative Court) made a significant confirmation of the effectiveness of sending applications by electronic means (ordinary e-mail) to entities obliged under the provisions of the Act on Access to Public Information, even when such an application (e-mail) does not go directly to the mailbox address or to the e-mail address of a specific person indicated as competent to accept them on behalf of the obligated party, but to spam, or other various defined folders in the IT system used by the obligated party. The author emphasizes the legitimacy of not only the ruling of the Supreme Administrative Court, but also its substantive justification.

Gloss on the Judgment of the Supreme Administrative Court of December 16, 2022, file ref. no. III OSK 5482/21

In the commented judgment, the Supreme Administrative Court (hereinafter: the Supreme Administrative Court) made a significant confirmation that a coalition agreement concluded by political parties constitutes public information within the meaning of the Constitution. The author emphasizes the legitimacy of the Supreme Administrative Court’s ruling but raises some contentious and questionable issues.