Changes to the law

Government restricts State Environmental Ombudsman’s Office

The black-blue state government in Salzburg is further restricting the rights and powers of the State Environmental Ombudsman's Office (LUA). On Thursday, it sent the amendment of several laws for review. 

As a result, the LUA is to be excluded from a number of procedures in future, such as the preparation of shooting plans, or lose the right of appeal to the Administrative Court.

Following the amendment to the Nature Conservation Act, which has already been adopted, there will now also be amendments to the Provincial Environmental Ombudsman Act, the National Park Act, the Environmental Protection and Environmental Information Act, the Spatial Planning Act, the Hunting Act, the Campsite Act, the Afforestation Rights Act and the Land Constitutional Act, in which, among other things, the LUA's right of appeal to the Administrative Court is now also to be abolished.

In its current form, the Provincial Environmental Ombudsman's Office often leads to a "lose-lose situation for all areas: nature conservation, agriculture and forestry, as well as our economic and general livelihoods", explained nature conservation officer Deputy Governor Marlene Svazek (FPÖ). 

Specifically, the LUA will no longer be involved in the following procedures: the reservation of approval in landscape protection ordinances, measures requiring notification and simplified nature conservation procedures. In future, these decisions will lie exclusively with the responsible authorities and experts.

It will also be excluded from procedures relating to agricultural and forestry buildings, freight and cable roads, land consolidation, small power generation plants and event venues, as well as hunting matters, such as the preparation and issuing of the shooting plan and the wildlife ecology advisory board.

The LUA's right of appeal to the Administrative Court is to be completely abolished. 

The amendments to the law are currently under review, which will last until November 14 and will then be forwarded to the provincial parliament for approval in December.