The case concerned access to documents held by the European Commission relating to an infringement procedure regarding the United Kingdom’s compliance with EU data protection rules.

In the course of the inquiry, the Ombudsman established that, of the ten issues originally raised with the United Kingdom, nine had been resolved.  As a result, the general presumption under EU law against disclosure no longer applied to the documents relating to those resolved issues. The Ombudsman therefore proposed that the Commission reassess the complainant’s request for public access based on an individual assessment of all the withheld documents.

The Commission did not accept the Ombudsman’s proposal for a solution. The Commission stated it had correctly applied the relevant exception and therefore saw no reason to reconsider its position.

The Ombudsman finds the decision of the Commission not to reconsider its position concerning disclosure of the documents constitutes maladministration.

This complaint concerns the European Commission’s decisions to authorise the importation of products containing, consisting of or produced from three genetically modified soybeans.

The complainant was of the view that the Commission wrongly authorised the importation. The arguments it presented to the Ombudsman were scientific in nature.

Given the Ombudsman’s limited role in reviewing decisions involving complex scientific assessments, she asked the complainant to point out any manifest errors in the Commission’s assessment. The complainant did not put forward evidence of a manifest error by the Commission. The Ombudsman also noted that the Commission had consulted the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) on the matter and that it drew on the conclusions reached in EFSA’s report in replying in substance to the complainant. On that basis, the Ombudsman found no maladministration.

The Ombudsman, however, takes note of the complainant’s concerns about what it sees as inadequate post-market monitoring proposals of the genetically modified products at issue in this case. While the Ombudsman cannot assess whether they are adequate or not, she agrees with the complainant about the importance of post-market monitoring and urges the Commission, in cooperation with EFSA, to continue to monitor carefully the effects of these products.

The case concerns the procedure the Consumers, Health and Food Executive Agency used to draw up a permanent, multi-annual list of external experts and to select experts from that list. The selected experts assist the Agency by carrying out support tasks in the area of promotion of agricultural products.

The complainant questioned the transparency of the selection process.

The Ombudsman inquired into the issue and found no reason to doubt its impartiality and transparency. She therefore closed the inquiry finding no maladministration.