Guidance WOB requests




Introduction


If you are not yet familiar with the possibilities to request additional information from the government about what you are doing, there are 2 general video presentations in relevant to this (in Dutch):




Purpose of the WOB requests



Pursuant to the Public Administration Act ("WOB"), information from the public that is available to the government can be requested. A general introduction to this, with a list of bodies from which the information can be obtained, can be found at Government Information Act.




What are we looking for?


For its ongoing actions, SOMI is seeking to investigate:



  • Ministry of Finance

  • Ministry of Economic Affairs

  • Prosecution

  • De Nederlandsche Bank N.V.

  • The Netherlands Authority for the Financial Markets

  • Consumer Authority & Dutch Market Competition Authority

  • Central Bureau of Statistics

  • The Central Planning Board

  • Governing Bodies of the European Union


Their answers will take us further in the dissemination of knowledge and advocacy in our actions. We ask for your input in order to ask the right questions.




Content


In order to be allocated, it is important that a question or request for information satisfies the legal requirements. A general overview of these requirements can be found on this link

here

Please note that the WOB contains exclusions, for example when it comes to the privacy of individuals or certain questions about organizations that are (already) subject to special legislation. If you have any doubts about the duration or the formulation of a question, you can always contact us. We may have seen certain questions come up before.




Follow up


If you have a good question in this matter, you can email it to us with relevant documents attached to it. We put the questions together and submit them all together, on behalf of everyone who is registered with SOMI. Where possible, we avoid duplicate questions or supplement your request with our own information and documents. We also ensure that all formal requirements are met and, if necessary, objections are made to reject requests for information.


All responses are published on the site. SOMI also publishes an overview of the most active and most valuable contributions. Please indicate when you want to remain anonymous, or you want to contribute under an alias or when you have had incurred expenses because of your contribution.



Links


For more information, see(in Dutch):