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Le plaignant était préoccupé par le fait que la plupart des informations figurant sur le site web de l’Agence européenne des médicaments (EMA) n'étaient disponibles qu’en anglais.

Dans le cadre de l’enquête, la Médiatrice a rappelé à l’EMA ses recommandations servant à guider l’administration de l’Union sur l’emploi des langues officielles de l’UE pour communiquer avec le public.

L’EMA a informé la Médiatrice qu’elle travaillait à l’élaboration d’une politique linguistique et d’une interface multilingue pour son site web.

La Médiatrice a salué l’intention de l’EMA de traiter la question et a clos l’enquête, en lui recommandant de traduire rapidement cet engagement dans les faits. Elle lui a également suggéré, dans l’intervalle, de s’atteler à accroître la visibilité des informations essentielles publiées sur son site web dans toutes les langues officielles de l’UE.

The case concerned the way in which the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) carried out a public consultation. The Ombudsman’s inquiry covered (i) the fact that the consultation was in English only, (ii) EASA’s web-based application to submit comments and (iii) the amount of time stakeholders had to submit comments.

The Ombudsman concluded that citizens who do not speak English were hindered from contributing meaningfully to the consultation. She therefore made a suggestion to EASA to review its practice.

At the same time, the Ombudsman found EASA’s system for submitting comments to be reasonably user-friendly and the amount of time stakeholders had to submit comments to be sufficient. The Ombudsman thus closed the case.

The European Commission runs a publicly accessible database, which informs interested parties about national technical regulations communicated to the Commission by EU Member States before their adoption. The database also allows interested parties to submit comments on the proposed national technical regulations.

The complainant is an international technical association for generation and storage of power and heat. It submitted comments on proposed technical rules that Germany intended to introduce.

As the German authorities had requested the Commission to keep information about the measures confidential, only limited information about these measures was accessible via the public database. The complainant took issue with this. The complainant was also concerned about how the Commission dealt with its comments, as it did not receive a substantive reply from the Commission after it made its comments.

The Ombudsman found no maladministration in how the Commission dealt with the complainant’s comments made under the notification procedure. The Ombudsman suggested, however, that the Commission provide clear information in its acknowledgements of receipt and on the database website, as to what interested parties can expect in terms of the Commission’s reply to their comments. Regarding the information that is made available, the Ombudsman expects the Commission carefully to monitor Member States’ use of confidential notifications under the Single Market Transparency Directive and to take the necessary measures in case of suspected abuse of the confidentiality provision.

The complaint concerned the fact that a press release containing remarks made by European Council President Donald Tusk on 6 February 2019 was made available in English, French and Irish only. The remarks were made following a meeting with the Irish Prime Minister.

The complainant had asked the Council to make available a German version of the press release. The Council replied that the press release would eventually be translated into all EU official languages.

The Ombudsman understands that it is the Council’s current practice to make remarks by the European Council President available in all EU official languages only in certain circumstances, for example when speaking after meetings of the European Council. Remarks made by the President following meetings with individual heads of state or government are generally made available either in English only, or in English and French, or in English, French and one additional official language. Thus, contrary to what the complainant was initially told by the Council, the press release in question was not translated into all official languages.

The Ombudsman acknowledges the need to strike an appropriate balance between linguistic diversity and administrative and budgetary constraints when translating documents. She also acknowledges that the EU institutions have some discretion in striking this balance. She considers that it was not manifestly wrong of the Council to make available the press release in question in English, French and Irish. At the same time, she considers that the Council should be transparent and clear about its translation policy and inform citizens accordingly. In this case, it provided misleading information to the complainant. This was regrettable.

L’affaire porte sur la manière dont l’Agence européenne des produits chimiques (ECHA) a procédé à une consultation des parties prenantes sur une proposition visant à restreindre la quantité de plomb dans les balles utilisées dans les zones humides. Le plaignant a contesté le libellé des questions et le fait que la consultation n’était disponible qu’en anglais.

La Médiatrice estime que les questions, et la possibilité d’envoyer des observations générales, ont permis aux participants d’exprimer leur opinion librement. En ce qui concerne les langues, toutefois, la Médiatrice a estimé que la justification de l’ECHA concernant l’utilisation de l’anglais uniquement n’était pas suffisante.

Par conséquent, la Médiatrice se félicite que l’ECHA s’engage, à l’avenir, à envisager de traduire dans d’autres langues au moins certaines parties de ses consultations. Lorsque l’ECHA restreint l’utilisation des langues, elle devrait mettre en place des garanties appropriées, par exemple en mettant à disposition un résumé dans toutes les langues officielles de l’UE, en proposant la documentation pertinente dans le plus grand nombre possible de langues et, surtout, en indiquant clairement que les réponses peuvent être présentées dans n’importe quelle langue officielle de l’UE. Ce dernier élément est un droit fondamental.

La Médiatrice a clôturé l’affaire en suggérant à l’ECHA d’éviter que des problèmes similaires ne se posent à l’avenir.