For German standards, this would have been a revolution in terms of digitalization: the federal states of Bremen and Saxony-Anhalt wanted to hand over the power of the so-called “National Once Only Technical System” (NOOTS) to the federal government if, in turn, the federal government alone Will bear the cost. Both countries argued that centralized control and financing would accelerate digitalization in Germany.
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But they were unable to accede to this original demand because most states wanted to maintain their influence over NOTOS: The federal and state IT Planning Council decided on Wednesday to stick with the classic, more complex model. This means that the federal and state governments will jointly finance and control NOOTS.
NOOTS is the technical center for register modernisation. Federal, state and local authorities should use this system to exchange information about citizens and companies with each other, if they allow it. Applicants will no longer be required to provide documents such as birth certificates or registration certificates, which will drastically reduce bureaucracy.
Decisions regarding control, funding and use of NOOTS were highly controversial within the committee. Federal CIO Markus Richter told a press conference after the meeting that discussions had taken place from the evening until late at night. When voting on the final proposal, several states abstained, not just Bremen and Saxony-Anhalt, the two initiators of the counterproposal.
countries want to pay less
The draft that has now been approved still has several open points that have to be finally clarified by the Prime Ministers’ Conference (MPK) in December. States are now demanding that the federal government bear a larger share of the cost of NOOTS. At this point, federal CIO Richter referred to the fact that the federal government is having difficulty making financing commitments in view of the upcoming provisional budget management. However, NOOTS funding has already been secured for 2025 and 2026, Richter stressed. The federal-state digitalization authority Fitco is providing a total of 70 million euros in funding for this purpose.
It has not yet been finalized how many federal states will be allowed to take decisions on NOOTS in the planned steering group. The current draft proposes a consortium of six states (plus the federal government). But some countries, including Bremen, want to reduce the group to speed up decision-making.
Martin Hagen, State Counselor to the Senator for Finance and Bremen’s representative on the IT Planning Council, said the current draft does not go far enough to quickly implement NOOTS. “But there is still a chance to take a decisive step forward and simplify governance. The MPK must decide now.”
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Bremen and Saxony-Anhalt had also previously demanded that all authorities in Germany join NOOTS. They wanted to ensure that, for example, tax offices also made their data available. On this point they had partial success: according to the new draft, not only the 51 registers already mentioned in the Register Modernization Act should communicate through NOOTS. Now all officials should be involved as soon as the technical and legal requirements are met. However, there is no time limit for the connection. Therefore politicians can avoid involvement in NOOTS by not creating prerequisites.
The IT Planning Council made several other proposals on Wednesday, which will be published in the next few days. Among other things, the federal and state governments adopted a joint IT strategy for the first time. The umbrella strategy is “the biggest step forward in recent years,” Richter, the federal CIO, said at the press conference. This is a “clear signal” to IT service providers from the administration that they want to strengthen competition and “break down islands”. Moreover, only once have such principles been established.
D.Digital also gave information on the decisions of the IT Planning Council on Tuesday on the subject of digitization. You can subscribe to the free 14-day newsletter here.
(CWO)
