Traditional butcher in Munich failed at the Higher Administrative Court
Consumers have a right to know how food companies have performed in official hygiene controls. This was decided by the Bavarian Administrative Court (BayVGH). According to the court order, inquiries via the online platform "Topf Secret" are lawful and must be answered by the responsible authorities. With its decision, the court followed the line of other higher administrative courts, which had already affirmed the right to information.
“The food industry wants to prevent citizens from finding out about the results of official food controls – with a large-scale lobbying campaign, hundreds of lawsuits and several legal opinions against our 'Topf Secret' platform. But the Bavarian judges make it clear: people have a legal right to the hygiene control results of bakeries, supermarkets, etc. Sleazy businesses cannot invoke data protection or EU food law and thus keep the results secret,” explained Rauna Bindewald , fully qualified lawyer and campaigner at foodwatch.
In Germany, only a fraction of the results of the official hygiene controls of bakeries, supermarkets and other food companies are currently being actively published by the authorities. However, since the beginning of last year, citizens have been able to query official test results on “Topf Secret” on the basis of the Consumer Information Act (VIG) – including those that the authorities have been keeping secret up to now.
In order to prevent "pot secret" and thus more transparency for consumers in hygiene controls, the food industry had recently tried to achieve a U-turn in case law with various commissioned reports from renowned professors. The reports came to the conclusion that the release of the information violated constitutional and European law. The central arguments of the professors were before the Bavarian Administrative Court - but were obviously not convincing. In its decision, the court now also commented on questions of European law - such as the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) - and made it clear that the protection of personal data cannot be held against the right to information.
In the specific case, a consumer had obtained the control reports for a branch of the "Topf Secret" from Munich butcher chain Vinzenzmurr requested. The authority wanted to release the information. Vinzenzmurr had tried to prevent this in court and failed in the first and second instance - the decision of the Bavarian Administrative Court is not contestable. Hundreds of food companies across Germany are taking action against the publication of hygiene control results.
With its decision, the Bavarian Administrative Court followed a number of other courts: First, the Federal Administrative Court fundamentally strengthened consumer information rights in a landmark judgment on VIG in August 2019. This was followed by decisions by higher administrative courts on "Topf Secret", which clearly affirmed the applicants' right to information, including the VGH Baden-Württemberg, the OVG North Rhine-Westphalia and the OVG Lower Saxony. Although the Hamburg Higher Administrative Court and the Higher Administrative Court of Rhineland-Palatinate have also passed resolutions on "Topf Secret" in summary proceedings, the courts in these cases left the actual disputed question of whether there is a right to information unanswered.
Source: foodwatch.de
