Digest

The seminar concerning information disclosure, entitled "Towards A More Open Society
: The U.S.Experience with Information Disclosure," was held on September 22 by co-sponsorship with The Japan Times and Tokyo American Center.

Two experts from the United States presented lectures on information disclosure in the United States and illustrated several cases to which the Freedom of Information Act of 1966 have been applied.

In Japan, although the official gazettes are going to be available through on-line systems, it is still incomplete and further consideration is strongly needed.

An important step toward satisfying the people's right to know will be to apply the Information Disclosure Law not only to the sessions within the ministries and agencies but also to the committees within both the House of Representatives and the House of Councilors in the future. By doing so, the activities by each Diet member will become transparent.


Editor's Comments

Last month, personal computers were set up in the offices of the members of the Diet. However, secretaries in the offices may not have enough time to make utmost use of these computers because they are inundated with daily business such as responding to complaints of the public. Currently, only about 20% of the Japanese Diet members have their own website. It will take a long time before the offices of the Diet members in Nagata-cho turn to truly computer-functional offices.