On Wednesday, the Cada (Commission for access to administrative documents) magistrate will hear an appeal from a group of teachers once morest French-speaking Education Minister Caroline Désir (PS) for refusing to provide information on teacher absences in Brussels schools. The Constitution guarantees citizens’ right to access administrative documents and obtain copies, which the Cada oversees for effectiveness. The Education Committee of the Parliament of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation questioned Minister Désir on the matter, and while the absences are recorded, the administration lacks the tools for systematic monitoring. The government has ordered the implementation of a new platform for administrative and financial management for the teaching staff in the coming years.
It is this Wednesday that the magistrate who chairs the Cada (Commission for access to administrative documents) will deal with the appeal brought by a group of teachers once morest the French-speaking Minister of Education, Caroline Désir (PS), following the refusal to the latter to provide the information requested concerning the absences of teachers in schools in the Brussels Region
The Constitution provides that every citizen has the right to consult an administrative document and to have a copy given to him. The Cada was set up to guarantee the effectiveness of this right. Its mission, when seized as here, is to determine the merits of a refusal to transmit data. Its decisions are binding.
In the Education Committee of the Parliament of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation, on Tuesday, three deputies questioned the minister on the file. Caroline Désir confirmed what our colleagues from La Libre Belgique indicated: the collection of teachers’ absences is carried out as the flows are transmitted by the disease control body, Certimed, for absences linked to medical certificates, and through other channels for other absences. “Everything is then entered into the system which makes it possible to pay for the treatments”, she explained.
“No systematic monitoring”
The Minister nevertheless immediately nuanced: “While this data is indeed present in the payroll system, it is not communicated to the administration and is not subject to separate monitoring allowing detailed analysis”. This does not mean that no data is mined, she reported. This is how an indicator of the rate of absences can in particular be transmitted each year to the schools via the Pilotage application.
“Neverthelessshe added, in the current state of the IT tools available to the administration, we cannot respond to the request of the collective, the administration does not have data allowing it to establish a systematic monitoring of the employment positions filled or not.
Aware of the need for more dynamic management and steering tools, the government ordered, in December, the implementation and deployment of a new platform for the administrative and financial management of members of the teaching staff, “In the coming years”.
As the Cada prepares to deal with the appeal brought by a group of teachers once morest Minister of Education Caroline Désir, the importance of the right to access administrative documents is highlighted. The Cada’s mission is to ensure the effectiveness of this right, and its decisions are binding. While the minister confirmed the collection of teachers’ absences is carried out through various channels, the data is not subject to separate monitoring to enable detailed analysis. With the implementation of a new platform for administrative and financial management of teachers in the coming years, the government acknowledges the need for more dynamic steering tools.
