Summary

  • The Council's 21 October Digital Omnibus mandate would let public bodies apply special reuse conditions and higher charges to very large enterprises; a Digital Markets Act gatekeeper designation is one factor in the calculation.
  • Public bodies would have to use proportionate, objective criteria. For certain protected data, Member States would publish the fee method and the body would disclose its main cost categories.

A municipal archive does not ask whether its visitor has a modest spreadsheet or a data-hungry empire. The Council's negotiating text would give that archive a reason to ask. Very large companies could face special terms when they reuse public-sector data and documents, with higher charges where the text allows them. The bill is still a legislative proposal: the Council's announcement puts negotiations with Parliament next.

The mandate's recitals explain the political wager. A few firms can accumulate and monetise immense volumes of data; a startup does not have the same machinery. Articles 32q and 32r give public bodies room to charge more or set special reuse conditions for very large enterprises. Economic power, the ability to acquire data and designation as a gatekeeper under the Digital Markets Act are explicit considerations. None is a euro amount. Member States may refine the criteria for deciding which enterprises are very large.

The proposed charges have boundaries. They must be proportionate and rest on objective criteria. The text lists costs such as collection, production, storage and, where relevant, anonymisation or confidentiality measures, plus a reasonable return. It also keeps a free-reuse rule for listed high-value datasets and certain research data, with the specified exceptions. The buffet metaphor gets you to the counter; the clauses tell you which dishes are on it.

For protected data, Article 32y goes further on the receipt. Member States would publish the fee criteria and methodology. The public body would publish its main cost categories and how costs were allocated. A future charge could then be checked against a tariff, a dataset and the explanation connecting them.