Parliamentary ombudsman rejects fund’s refusal to release assessment records

The Development Fund for Educational Materials failed to comply with administrative law when it handled a request for access to documents after rejecting a grant application, mbl.is reports.

This is the conclusion of the Parliamentary Ombudsman, who disagreed with the fund’s decision.

The fund invited applications for grants at the beginning of last year. The person who later complained about the rejected application had applied for a grant of 2.25 million Icelandic króna.

A notice published on the fund’s website in June that year said it had received 94 valid applications, with total funding requests of about 216 million króna. The fund awarded 89.3 million króna to 36 projects.

Fund said it was not required to release documents

The individual argued that the fund’s handling of the case had breached procedural rules under administrative law, including Article 15 on a party’s right to access the documents in their case.

The request concerned two assessment forms: one completed by an external expert and another by a member of the fund’s board. The fund said the documents were working documents that it was not required to disclose.

The Parliamentary Ombudsman disagreed.

The ombudsman said the expert’s assessment form could not be considered a working document under administrative law, meaning the refusal to release it had not been based on the correct legal grounds.

The refusal to provide access to the board member’s assessment form, which did qualify as a working document, also failed to comply with the applicable provisions of administrative law. In addition, the fund had not given reasons for its decision.

The ombudsman therefore concluded that the fund’s handling of the request for information did not meet the requirements of administrative law.