Strasbourg, 11 July 2006

Dear Mr R.,

On 15 May 2005, you complained to the European Ombudsman about Eurostat's homepage.

On 30 June 2005, I forwarded your complaint to the President of the European Commission. The Commission sent its opinion on 9 September 2005. I forwarded it to you with an invitation to make observations, which you sent on 8 December 2005.

On 13 March 2006, you sent me further correspondence to which I replied on 19 April 2006.

I am writing now to let you know the results of the inquiries that I have made into your complaint.

THE COMPLAINT

In an e-mail of 20 January 2005, the complainant asked Eurostat to respond to the following: (i) "Could you please kindly tell me how to find [the] 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries' in your website?" and (ii) "[w]ould you please post a list of the titles of all Eurostat's data and publications in alphabetical order in your website [...]?"

On 24 January 2005, an official at Eurostat informed the complainant that "[a]ll of Eurostat's data and publications are freely accessible on our website". On 2 February 2005, the complainant sent Eurostat an e-mail in which he asked about accessibility to the above documents, as indicated in his e-mail of 20 January 2005. On 15 May 2005, the complainant submitted a complaint to the European Ombudsman.

This complaint contained no evidence that the complainant had received a reply to his e-mail of 2 February 2005. The Ombudsman's services therefore asked the complainant, in an e-mail of 21 June 2005, whether he had received a reply to his e-mail of 2 February 2005 to Eurostat (a transcript of the e-mail was attached to the initial complaint). The complainant replied by e-mail on 23 June 2005, stating that he had neither received a reply to his e-mail to Eurostat nor "seen any solution in its website to [his] questions".

In his complaint, the complainant alleged that Eurostat had failed to respond properly to the request that he had addressed to it by his e-mail of 20 January 2005.

The complainant claimed (i) that Eurostat should make the 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries' searchable on its website, and (ii) that Eurostat should publish an alphabetical list of the titles of all its data and publications on its website.

In the opening letter to the Commission (of which Eurostat is a service), the Ombudsman furthermore drew the Commission's attention to the fact that the complainant had stated that he had not received a reply to his e-mail of 2 February 2005.

THE INQUIRY

The Commission's opinion

In its opinion, the Commission made the following remarks:

Eurostat's services had received the complainant's e-mail on 20 January 2005. As far as it understood, the complainant had essentially suggested that Eurostat's publications, including the 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries', should be put on its website free of charge. In a reply message, the complainant had been asked to fill in Eurostat's online request form, which he did on 21 January 2005. On 24 January 2005, Eurostat's user-support service informed the complainant that "[a]ll of Eurostat's data and publications are freely accessible on our website". Although the answer could have been more detailed concerning the location of the specific publication on the website, it had to be noted that the request was limited only to the free accessibility of publications. In this respect, Eurostat's answer was correct.

Concerning the complainant's e-mail of 2 February 2005, no trace of any correspondence between Eurostat and the complainant after 24 January 2005 could be found. During the period of the alleged e-mail exchange, Eurostat's e-mail service encountered difficulties due to huge spam mail attacks. Therefore, Eurostat could not guarantee that, during the filtering process, non-spam mail (such as the complainant's e-mail of 2 February 2005) might not have been affected.

The presentation of publications on the website

At present, the overall organisation as well as the retrieval function of Eurostat's website is based on the assumption that users prefer to use a thematic approach. In light of experience with users, an alphabetically ordered complete list was not considered to be a suitable means of presenting publications.

The publication of an alphabetical list of Eurostat's publications would not be appropriate for a number of reasons. Titles ve ry often begin with words such as 'the', 'European' or 'statistical'. There are large numbers of publications of a very different nature stored on Eurostat's website and their presentation by alphabetical order would be confusing and make research very difficult. Therefore, Eurostat's website is organised on the basis of a thematic approach, which is generally appreciated by its users.

The availability of the requested publication

Concerning the publications available on the website, Eurostat has a policy of automatically replacing outdated publications with their newest versions, the titles of which vary slightly from previous ones.

The title that the complainant was searching for had been replaced by a new edition with up-to-date data under the title 'Statistical Yearbook on candidate countries'. This edition had been put on the server in November 2003.

With respect to the search function, Eurostat's website is equivalent to those of the most commonly used internet sites.

The absence of reply to the e-mail of 2 February 2005 from the complainant

As a consequence of the non-receipt of the complainant's second e-mail, Eurostat had not been aware of the complainant's ongoing problems and had therefore been unable to further assist him. As explained above, Eurostat's e-mail service was at the time a victim of huge spam mail and it could not be guaranteed that the complainant's e-mail had not been deleted by the filtering protection systems. The Commission regretted the incident, which was beyond its control and responsibility. However, on both previous occasions, the complainant had received an answer within 24 working hours. The absence of a reply to his third e-mail could reasonably have led the complainant to inquire further with Eurostat's services.

Eurostat acted promptly on all requests from the complainant. The unfortunate incident of the lost e-mail of 2 February 2005 was regrettable but could not be attributed to maladministration by Commission services.

Generally, Eurostat is dedicated to meeting the user's needs by permanently improving its products and its website.

The complainant's observations

In his observations, the complainant made, in summary, the following remarks:

Eurostat's handling of e-mails

Eurostat's explanation that the service had been a victim of extensive spam mail at the time of his e-mail of 2 February 2005 was not tenable because spam e-mailers send unwanted e-mails by scanning the e-mail addresses available on the Internet, whereas the complainant had filled in Eurostat's online form.

Certain providers of e-mail accounts have improved their services in such a way that spam e-mails are reduced to about five per day while normal e-mails are not affected.

Eurostat should submit evidence that its e-mail service was a victim of extensive spam mail at the time of the e-mail of 2 February 2005.

Eurostat should improve its e-mail system in order to reduce spam mail without adversely affecting normal e-mails.

Eurostat "has a duty to" set up a system to trace and recover any wrongly deleted e-mails.

Eurostat's website publications

The thematic classification of Eurostat's publications does not suffice and could cause confusion in cases such as 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries', which covers agriculture, industry, services and so on. Furthermore, users cannot know if the same publication appears under a modified title or whether it has been removed. This uncertain and inconvenient situation could be resolved if there were an alphabetical list of publications where users could find similar titles, the year of publication and any subsequent publications. Examples of such a system can be found on the websites of the European University Institute ("EUI") and the [United States] Congress libraries, which allow alphabetical searches. These two examples show that alphabetical classification of the publications on the website is appropriate, not confusing, and renders the search very easy.

With regard to the automatic replacement of outdated publications on Eurostat's website, it should be noted that old data are not outdated and can still be useful for comparative analyses. The online catalogues of the EUI and the Congress libraries still keep 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-European Countries' up to its last issue in 2003, whereas the body that compiled the data (Eurostat) does not.

Publications on Eurostat's website should allow users "to click the title to see a table of the complete contents, and further click the content to see all the items and sub-items". An example of such search option is 'Japan Statistical Yearbook 2005' where all 27 contents are displayed together with items and sub-items that can be read by clicking on them.

Thus, Eurostat should make it possible to conduct an exact title search.

Finally, designers of Eurostat's website should posses a "university library science degree".

THE DECISION

1 Preliminary remarks - new claims

1.1 In an e-mail of 20 January 2005, the complainant asked Eurostat to respond to the following: (i) "Could you please kindly tell me how to find [the] 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries' in your website?" and (ii) "[w]ould you please post a list of the titles of all Eurostat's data and publications in alphabetical order in your website [...]?" On 2 February 2005, the complainant had sent Eurostat an e-mail in which he asked about accessibility to the above documents. The complaint contained no evidence that the complainant received a reply to this e-mail. The Ombudsman's services therefore asked the complainant whether he had received a reply to his e-mail of 2 February 2005 to Eurostat. The complainant replied by stating that he had neither received a reply to this e-mail nor "seen any solution in its website to my questions". In his complaint to the Ombudsman, the complainant alleged that Eurostat had failed properly to respond to the request that he had addressed to it by his e-mail of 20 January 2005. The complainant claimed (i) that Eurostat should make the 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries' searchable on its website, and (ii) that Eurostat should publish an alphabetical list of the titles of all its data and publications on its website. On 30 June 2005, the Ombudsman opened an inquiry into the above allegation and claims made by the complainant.

1.2 In the Ombudsman's letter opening an inquiry into the present complaint, the Commission, of which Eurostat is a service, was informed that the complainant had stated (not in the initial complaint but in an e-mail of 23 June 2005 to the Ombudsman) that he had received no reply to his e-mail of 2 February 2005. This statement was not identified by the Ombudsman as an allegation and was therefore not taken up for inquiry.

1.3 In its opinion, the Commission rejected the allegation and claims identified in the Ombudsman's opening letter of 30 June 2005. Regarding the lack of reply to the complainant's e-mail of 2 February 2005, the Commission stated that, at the time of the complainant's e-mail, Eurostat's e-mail services were encountering difficulties because of huge spam mail attacks and that, during the filtering process, non-spam mail, such as the complainant's e-mail of 2 February 2005, might have been affected.

1.4 In his observations, the complainant maintained his initial allegation and claims. He also made the following new claims: (i) Eurostat should submit evidence that its e-mail service was a victim of extensive spam mail at the time he sent it his e-mail of 2 February 2005; (ii) Eurostat should improve its e-mail system in order to reduce spam mail without adversely affecting normal e-mails; (iii) Eurostat "has a duty to" set up a system to trace and recover any wrongly deleted e-mails; (iv) publications on Eurostat's website should allow users "to click the title to see a table of complete contents, and further click the content to see all the items and sub-items"; (v) Eurostat should make it possible to conduct an exact title search; and (vi) the designers of Eurostat's website should posses a "university library science degree".

1.5 The Ombudsman notes that the above six new claims concern issues that do not fall within the scope of the present inquiry. Claims identified under points (i), (ii) and (iii) concern the Commission's dealing with spam mail; the claim identified under point (iv) concerns the qualities of a document once found and does not concern the possibility of finding the document; the claim identified under point (v) concerns search functionalities on Eurostat's website; and the new claim identified under point (vi) concerns the professional qualifications of the website designers. The Ombudsman also notes that none of these new claims appears to have been the subject of prior administrative approaches to the Commission, in accordance with Article 2(4) of the Statute of the Ombudsman(1). Under these circumstances, the Ombudsman does not consider it appropriate to take up for inquiry the above new claims made in the complainant's observations. The Ombudsman points out that the complainant has the possibility of lodging a new complaint if he wishes to pursue the above-mentioned claims, after having made appropriate administrative approaches to the Commission.

2 Alleged failure to respond properly to a request sent to Eurostat by e-mail

2.1 The complainant alleged that Eurostat has failed properly to respond to the following request that he sent to Eurostat by e-mail of 20 January 2005: (i) "Could you please kindly tell me how to find [the] 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries' in your website?" and (ii) "[w]ould you please post a list of the titles of all Eurostat's data and publications in alphabetical order in your website [...]?" On 24 January 2005, an official at Eurostat informed the complainant that "[a]ll of Eurostat's data and publications are freely accessible on our website". On 2 February 2005, the complainant sent Eurostat an e-mail in which he asked about the accessibility of the above documents. In his e-mail of 23 June 2005 to the Ombudsman, the complainant clarified that he had neither received a reply to his e-mail of 2 February 2005 to Eurostat nor "seen any solution in its website to [his] questions".

2.2 In its opinion, the Commission stated that Eurostat's services did indeed receive an e-mail from the complainant on 20 January 2005. The Commission neither referred to the exact content of the e-mail it had received nor contested the factual accuracy of the complainant's above-mentioned statement as regards the content of this e-mail. The Commission simply indicated that, as far as it understood, the complainant had essentially suggested putting Eurostat's publications, in particular the 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries', on its website free of charge. In a reply message, the complainant was asked to fill out the Eurostat online request form, which he did on 21 January 2005. On 24 January 2005, Eurostat's user-support service informed the complainant that "[a]ll of Eurostat's data and publications are freely accessible on our website". The Commission noted that, although the answer could have been more detailed concerning the location of the specific publication on the website, the request was limited only to the free accessibility of publications. In this respect, the Commission considered that Eurostat's answer was correct.

2.3 The Ombudsman first notes that principles of good administration, enshrined in Article 22 of the European Code of Good Administrative Behaviour(2) and Sections 2 and 4 of the European Commission's Code of Good Administrative Behaviour(3), require that the Commission provide citizens with the information they have requested, unless it invokes valid and adequate grounds for not doing so. Under the principle of good administration, enshrined in Article 12(1) of the Code of Good Administrative Behaviour(4), the Commission is required to reply as completely and accurately as possible to questions asked and to be service-minded, correct, courteous and accessible in relations with the public.

2.4 Furthermore, the Ombudsman observes that the content of the complainant's e-mail of 20 January 2005 referred to above ("[c]ould you please kindly tell me how to find [the] 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries' in your website?" and "[w]ould you please post a list of the titles of all Eurostat's data and publications in alphabetical order in your website [...]?") could not reasonably be understood as referring only, or even at all, to the issue whether "[a]ll of Eurostat's data and publications are freely accessible on our website" as stated in Eurostat's reply of 24 January 2005 to the complainant. Therefore, it appears that, in its reply of 24 January 2005, Eurostat failed to properly address the content of the complainant's e-mail of 20 January 2005.

2.5 Nevertheless, the Ombudsman notes that, in the opinion it submitted in the context of the present inquiry, the Commission addressed the actual substance of the above questions made by the complainant. The Commission thus appears to have taken steps in response to this part of the complaint. For this reason, the Ombudsman considers that no further inquiry is justified into this aspect of the case.

3 The claim that Eurostat should make the 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries' searchable on Eurostat's website

3.1 The complainant claimed that Eurostat should make the 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries' searchable on its website.

3.2 In its opinion, t he Commission stated that, concerning the publications available on the website, Eurostat has a policy of automatically replacing outdated publications by their newest versions, whose titles may vary slightly from the previous ones . The title that the complainant was searching for had been replaced by a new edition with up-to-date data under the title 'Statistical Yearbook on candidate countries'. This edition had been put on the server in November 2003.

3.3 In his observations, the complainant argued that old data and publications are not outdated and can still be useful for comparative analyses. Online catalogues of the European University Institute ("EUI") and the Congress(5) libraries still keep 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-European Countries' up to its last issue in 2003, whereas its compiler, that is, Eurostat, does not.

3.4 The Ombudsman notes that the establishment of Commission websites, providing the public with various kinds of information about the Commission's organisation and activities, as well as the possibilities to contact its services, is a valuable proactive means of compliance with the principles of good administration, in particular with those indicated in point 2.3 above. Although the Commission may not have, at the present time, discretion as to the continued existence of such websites, in view of the constantly growing importance and widespread use of Internet communication, the Ombudsman remarks that, taking into account the nature of the issues and choices involved, which pertain to a relatively new and fast-developing medium of communication, the Commission does enjoy, in principle, a considerable margin of discretion as to what kind and amount of information it includes in its websites and, especially, as to how this information is made available and searchable. Hence, the Ombudsman's scope of review is limited, in this context, to whether the Commission has manifestly exceeded the limits of its relevant discretionary powers.

3.5 The complainant challenges, in essence, Eurostat's policy decision to replace on its website the publication indicated by the complainant by the relevant, more recent, edition (bearing a slightly different title). This decision was made in the context of Eurostat's discretionary powers as to whether, when it includes in its website the newest versions of a serial publication, containing the most recent data on a given subject-matter, it will also keep in its website older versions of publications (or their titles). Such publications might still be useful, for example for comparative analysis, as suggested by the complainant. And they might still appear on online catalogues of certain libraries, as argued by the complainant. Nevertheless, the Ombudsman takes the view that these arguments do not show that Eurostat, by taking the above decision, manifestly exceeded the limits of the considerable discretion it enjoys in this context, as explained above. Neither the mere fact that certain data may be useful for citizens nor the content of online catalogues of libraries, taking into account the purposes they serve, can be considered as probative of such a fault. Hence, although it could be advisable to make publications, such as the one indicated by the complainant, available and searchable on Eurostat's website, and although Eurostat is encouraged to examine this issue, in light of the arguments made by the complainant in his observations, the Ombudsman finds no maladministration as regards this aspect of the case and cannot therefore uphold the complainant's claim.

4 The claim that Eurostat should publish an alphabetical list of the titles of all its data and publications on its website

4.1 The complainant claimed that Eurostat should publish an alphabetical list of the titles of all its data and publications on its website.

4.2 In its opinion, t he Commission stated that the overall organisation as well as the retrieval function on Eurostat's website is based on the assumption that users prefer to use a thematic approach. In light of experience with users, an alphabetically ordered complete list was not considered as a suitable means of presenting publications. The publication of an alphabetical list of Eurostat's publications would not be appropriate for a number of reasons. Titles ve ry often begin with words such as 'the', 'European' or 'statistical'. There are large numbers of publications of a very different nature stored on Eurostat's website and their presentation by alphabetical order would be confusing and would make research very difficult. Therefore, Eurostat's website is organised on the basis of a thematic approach, which is generally appreciated by its users.

4.3 In his observations, the complainant argued that thematic classification does not suffice, and could cause confusion in cases when a publication covers several different themes. Furthermore, users cannot know if the same publication appears under a modified title or whether it has been removed. This uncertain and inconvenient situation could be resolved if there were an alphabetical list of publications. The examples of the libraries of the EUI and the United States Congress show that the publication of an alphabetical list of all titles in the website catalogue is completely appropriate, not confusing, and makes research very easy.

4.4 As already noted in point 3.4 above, the Commission enjoys, in principle, a considerable margin of discretion as to the kind and amount of information it includes in its websites and, especially, as to how this information is made available and searchable. Hence, the Ombudsman's scope of review is limited accordingly.

4.5 Here, the complainant has essentially requested that Eurostat introduce an additional search option in its website. This is a matter which falls within the scope of Eurostat's discretionary powers referred to above. Eurostat has stated that the search option suggested by the complainant is not a suitable means of presenting publications, because of the great numbers of publications of a very different nature stored on Eurostat's website and the words which are very often found at the beginning of the titles. The Ombudsman does not exclude that a search option based on an alphabetical list of the titles of the materials on Eurostat's website might be useful, in certain cases, for visitors of this website, as argued by the complainant. Nevertheless, taking into consideration the above explanations provided by Eurostat's for its decision not to incorporate such a search option on its website, the Ombudsman takes the view that it has not been shown that Eurostat, by taking this decision, manifestly exceeded the limits of the considerable discretion it enjoys in this context. The mere fact that the search option indicated by the complainant might, in certain cases, prove to be useful for citizens cannot be considered as probative of such a fault. Moreover, with respect to the complainant's argument that such a search option is found in the websites of the libraries of the EUI and of the [United States](6) Congress, the Ombudsman notes that he is unable to confirm that this is actually the case and that, in any event, the complainant has not provided any kind of evidence or concrete information in support of this argument. Hence, the Ombudsman finds no maladministration as regards this aspect of the case and does not, therefore, uphold the complainant's claim.

5 Conclusion

On the basis of the Ombudsman's inquiries into this complaint, it appears that the Commission initially failed to properly address the content of the complainant's e-mail of 20 January 2005. Nevertheless, the Ombudsman notes that the Commission, in the opinion it submitted in the context of the present inquiry, addressed the actual substance of the complainant's e-mail of 20 January 2005. The Commission thus appears to have taken steps in response to this part of the complaint. For this reason, the Ombudsman considers that no further inquiry is justified into this aspect of the case. Moreover, the Ombudsman has found no maladministration as regards the Commission's rejection of the complainant's claims that it should make the 'Statistical Yearbook on Candidate and South-East European Countries' searchable on Eurostat's website and that it should publish an alphabetical list of the titles of all its data and publications on its website.

The President of the Commission will be informed of this decision.

Yours sincerely,

 

P. Nikiforos DIAMANDOUROS

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(1) Article 2(4) of the Statute provides that "[a] complaint [...] must be preceded by the appropriate administrative approaches to the institutions and bodies concerned." The purpose of the 'prior administrative approaches' requirement is to give the institution or body concerned the possibility to correct its behaviour, or at least to explain itself, before a complaint is made to the Ombudsman, and subsequently, in case a complaint is lodged with the Ombudsman, to enable him to take into consideration the institution's reply when deciding on the existence of sufficient grounds for opening an inquiry.

(2) Article 22 of the Code of Good Administrative Behaviour (http://www.euro-ombudsman.eu.int/code/ en/default.htm) provides, inter alia: "1. The official shall [...] provide members of the public with the information that they request. [...] The official shall take care that the information communicated is clear and understandable. [...] 3. If, because of its confidentiality, an official may not disclose the information requested, he or she shall, in accordance with Article 18 of this Code, indicate to the person concerned the reasons why he cannot communicate the information."

(3) OJ 2000 L 308, p. 32. Section 2 of this Code provides, inter alia: "Where a member of the public requires information relating to a Commission administrative procedure, staff will ensure that this information is provided within the deadline fixed for the procedure in question." Section 4 provides: " The Commission undertakes to answer enquiries in the most appropriate manner and as quickly as possible."

(4) Article 12(1) of the Code of Good Administrative Behaviour provides: "The official shall be service-minded, correct, courteous and accessible in relations with the public. When answering correspondence, telephone calls and e-mails, the official shall try to be as helpful as possible and shall reply as completely and accurately as possible to questions which are asked."

(5) The Ombudsman presumes that the complainant refers to the Congress of the United States.

(6) See footnote 5 in point 3.3 above.