Overview

• Minister Manfred Pentz presented the Entbürokratisierungsgesetz to the Landtag for a first reading, starting the legislative debate.
• The draft bundles roughly 120 measures across more than 90 laws to enable email-based procedures and accept digital copies instead of originals or certified copies.
• The package would remove the 2023 requirement to document climate impacts for all state laws and regulations and would reduce mandatory hearings for nature protection authorities.
• In several areas, higher authorities would only need to notify other offices rather than obtain their approval, curbing reporting obligations and inter-agency sign-offs.
• Opposition parties split in their critiques: the Greens call the plan small-scale and warn of weaker standards, the FDP pushes for fully digital-by-default services citing Estonia, and the AfD claims looser documentation rules could fuel fraud.