[FSFE] Interoperable Europe Act: Committee of the Regions fails to substantially promote Free Software

[press at fsfe.org]

 = Interoperable Europe Act: Committee of the Regions fails to substantially promote Free Software =

[ Read online: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230524-01.it.html ]

The Committee of the Regions approved its opinion on the Interoperable
Europe Act. The EU representative body has failed to recognise the
importance that Free Software has for interoperability and thus for
digitalisation and innovation. This underlines the relevance of Free
Software Community's participation in the planned Interoperable Board.

With the EU's objective of establishing a legal framework on
interoperability through the Interoperable Europe Act, today the
Committee of the Regions has adopted its opinion in plenary. While the
opinion has feebly mentioned the role of Free Software in achieving
cross-border interoperability and avoiding vendor lock-in in its policy
recommendations, the Committee of the Regions has failed in
substantially improving the original text and bringing up more solid and
necessary measures. It lacks to introduce a “Free Software first”
approach and the involvement of stakeholders in the Interoperable Europe
Board, an intended body that shall decide on upcoming steps arising from
this legislation.


/““It is incomprehensible that the institution who has the
responsibility to bring up the demands of thousands of local and
regional administrations fails in featuring the importance of Free
Software for interoperability. Hence, this decision only reaffirms the
importance of the involvement of stakeholder, who have actual
competence, in this decision making processes . We, therefore, urge the
European Parliament to include the Free Software community in the
Interoperable Europe Board to guarantee sustainability and innovation in
digitalisation. Furthermore a 'Free Software first' approach still needs
to be introduced", explains Lina Ceballos, FSFE Policy Project Manager./

The role that Free Software plays in the digitalisation of local and
regional administrations has shown to be of the great importance,
especially during the corona pandemic. Among other, it strengthens
digital sovereignty allowing administrations to have control over the
software they are using, while it enables that public funds are spent in
the most efficient way. For these reasons, over the last years the FSFE
has been demanding with its 'Public Money? Public Code!' initiative [1]
that publicly financed software should be made publicly available under
a Free Software licence. It is now up to the European Parliament to
ensure interoperability is introduced by a “Free Software first”
approach while including the Free Software community on the path to
digitalise European public administrations. First Amendments in this
direction have been introduced already, however, the position has to be
further improved. Further read [2].

 1: https://publiccode.eu/
 2: https://fsfe.org/news/2023/news-20230323-02.it.html

  == Informazioni sulla Free Software Foundation Europe ==

  La Free Software Foundation Europe è una Onlus che incoraggia gli utenti
  ad avere il controllo della tecnologia. Il Software è presente in tutti
  gli aspetti della nostra vita ed è importante che questa tecnologia ci
  aiuti anziché limitarci. Il Software Libero garantisce a tutti il
  diritto di usare, studiare, modificare e condividere il software. Questi
  diritti aiutano a sostenere altre libertà fondamentali come il diritto
  di parola, la libertà di stampa e la privacy.

  La FSFE aiuta persone e organizzazioni a comprendere come il Software
  Libero contribuisce alla libertà, alla trasparenza e
  all'auto-determinazione.  Potenziamo i diritti degli utenti abolendo le
  barriere che esistono nell'adottare il Software Libero, incoraggiamo le
  persone ad usare e sviluppare il Software Libero e forniamo le risorse
  per consentire a tutti di promuovere ulteriormente il Software Libero in
  Europa. 

  https://fsfe.org