Recurrent: AEAT / Ministry of Finance

Recurred resolution: R/0690/2024

In exercise of the right of access to public information, two requests for access to the monthly referral of the list of productivity of the staff of the special delegation of Valencia of the AEAT were presented to the State Administration of Tax Administration of the Ministry of Finance, according to a determined level of disaggregation, from January 2022 to the date of the request.

The Council agreed to accumulate the complaint procedures relating to the two requests, noting that the intimate connection required by Article 57 of the LPAC, as well as the identity of the body that resolves and processes the procedure, was present in order to pronounce on them in a single resolution.

The Administration did not respond within the legally established time limit, although later, in the processing of claims urged within the claim procedure, it raised the suspension of the same, considering that there was a situation of litispendence with the ordinary procedure PO 0001234/2023, regarding the contentious-administrative appeal filed against the previous claim of this Council R CTBG 0327-2023, of 5 May.

The Council rejects the suspension, since it does not consider in this case a determinant or indispensable character of the judgment that is issued in the judicial process (PO 1234/2023) to resolve the claim.

On the other hand, with regard to the merits of the case, considering that this is public information according to the definition contemplated in Article 13 LTBG, and that its access must be decided according to the result that yields the weighting required in Article 15.3 LTAIBG, in accordance with Interpretative Criterion 1/2015, of June 24, developed jointly by this Council and the Spanish Data Protection Agency (AEPD), it concludes that, in relation to the level 30, 29 and 28 positions (the latter provided are of free designation) or equivalent, it is clear that the right of public access must prevail.

In addition, the Council takes into consideration the particular circumstance that the applicants for the information are officials of the Delegation of the AEAT of Valencia, members of the Staff Board and trade union delegates, and that the intention is related to the distribution of the productivities of public employees in the scope of their organization; question in which there is a specific legal rule in Article 23.3 c) of Law 30/1984, of 2 August, on Measures for the Reform of the Public Service (LMRFP), according to which "[e]n any case, the amounts received by each public official by this concept will be the Department or other interested.

It also highlights the existence of an obvious public interest in knowing how public funds are distributed as variable remuneration to the specific workers of an organ, agency or entity, in order to assess whether there have been unjustified arbitrariness, abuse or discrimination and, ultimately, to be able to demand the corresponding accountability of a Public Administration in an area as essential to detect a good or bad functioning as is the management of public money in relation to the non-fixed remuneration of public employees.

Finally, it is clear that, since the right has been exercised by a workers’ representative, it is not necessary to articulate the hearing procedure provided for in articles 19.3 and 24.3 LTAIBG in accordance with the doctrine established in the Judgment of the Supreme Court of 15 October 2020 (ECLI:TS:ES:3195:2020).