Why Bulgaria State Gazette is Not Available on Internet?
In April, the Parliament of Bulgaria adopted amendments to the regulations of the State Gazette. It is expected that public procurement tenders will be available on the Gazette website and that it would safe time and effort both for the government and interested suppliers. According to different estimates, GOB buys products and services that amount to 13-16 of GDP; in some sectors of the Bulgarian market it is above 50%”, said a company manager interviewed by us. This is the case in pharmaceuticals (65%) and software (50%).
The new practice would not solve the publicity of criteria and other accountability problems of the public procurement. But the amendment allows up speculating on the issue, raised in the title: why not putting the entire Gazette on Internet if this is possible for a part of it?
By all accounts, Bulgaria is heading towards formal membership in the EU. Presumably, the government of Bulgaria (GOB) should be already informing citizens on both domestic and EU laws and regulations.
The body of law is expanding.
Source: House of Lords
But the GOB is one of the few in Europe that still does not provide for free access to normative acts that govern the country's life and published in the State Gazette.
Prices for electronic versions of the State Gazette are prohibitive: BGN 6,010. If the active, business and non-profit Bulgaria-registered corporations are 300,000 (according to NSI criteria, i.e. those that pay taxes) and if they decide to subscribe they would needs to spend BGN 1.8 billion. (This amount would equal to 4.75% of GDP.) This is not happening. Three companies have full subscription and then resell the State Gazette at an average price of BGN 1,000.
Key EU member states avoid such unnecessary costs.
Source : http://forum.europa.eu.int/irc/opoce/ojf/info/data/prod/html/gaz1.htm
In the UK, Her Majesty's Stationery Office (operating as part of the Cabinet Office under the ministerial control of the Minister for the Cabinet Office) publishes laws and regulations on Internet and, like in most if not all OECD countries; this publication is free of charge and legally binding. In other words: legislation published on the Internet carries the same official status as the printed version (1).
In Bulgaria the situation is just the opposite: only paper versions are legally binding and legislations is by no means available free of charge. This causes additional and reoccurring costs of paper work and bureaucracy. April 2005 amendments to the Bulgarian State Gazette Law (which are to be enforced on May 1) failed to change this constellation.
Obviously, besides the obvious benefits of the provisional reform, it is not taking place by itself. The reason is simple: special interest groups are better at organizing than larger groups of individuals, be they tax payers,businesses or consumers; the smaller collective groups gain easier from government intervention since costs are spread and borne by a larger group. At the same time, the reform is far from trivial: it should involve all normative acts of central and municipal authorities and the so-called “unofficial section” of the State Gazette (corporate registration and announcements, public procurement offers, citizens status, etc.) and the functions of respective registries (or their pending reforms). On the other hand, however, all these would benefit from the reform.
—————————-
(1) In UK, this status of the Internet publication of bills and regulations was established in 2002. 
