Bundestag study recommends amendment of law to promote open source
Joinup, the EU’s public sector open source news site, reports today that a German parliament study group is recommending amendments to budgetary legislation to allow software produced by or for public sector organisations to be released as open source software. Germany’s budget law currently prevents public sector organisations from giving away software for free.
In its report (PDF, German), the Bundestag’s Interoperability, Standards and Free Software group is proposing six measures to promote the uptake of free and open source software by Federal and regional authorities, including resuming funding the currently defunct open source competence centre. This could assist public sector organisations wanting to migrate proprietary to free and open source software. The group is also calling on all public sector organisations to create new software that is “as platform-independent as possible”.
Furthermore, the group, which is chaired by FDP deputy Jimmy Schulz, also wants the Federal government actively to encourage the use of open standards. This would make access to the government easier for both citizens and companies, as well as being an incentive for software development.