Austrian Government Decrees Digitalization Drive for Public Administration

Through the elimination of duplicate entries, 70,000 administrative procedures per year will be eliminated, according to the government. Schellhorn, who is responsible for reducing bureaucracy at the Ministry of Finance, spoke of a step "weg vom Antragsstaat, hin zum Servicestaat". He also anticipates an end to the "Tour de farce", in which files arrive at offices digitally only to be printed out, filled in, and scanned back in.

Update of June 20, 2026: In the new version of the project, the government specified the technical building blocks. A draft amendment to the General Administrative Procedure Act is planned that would allow authorities at the federal, state, and municipal levels to use digital assistance systems. These tools are intended to identify missing information in procedures at an early stage and thus help avoid delays. In addition, automated procedures are to be made possible without an application, for example when a new child is registered in the registration system.

What Is New Since June 20, 2026

What Is New Since June 20, 2026

Since the last reporting, the responsible state secretaries have particularly emphasized the importance of personal contact with the authorities. SPÖ State Secretary Jörg Leichtfried made clear that direct in-person government services will continue to exist and that the digital offerings are expressly a supplement. The amendment to the General Administrative Procedure Act is to be passed by the National Council soon, according to the accompanying documents. This shifts the focus of the reform from a mere linking of registers to a comprehensive modernization of procedures.

Criticism and Reactions from Parliament

A central infrastructure project is the expansion of the data hub "Digital Austrian Data Exchange" (dadeX) into the central data infrastructure for the Austrian state. In the internal jargon of the reform partners, the project is known as "Project X". Pröll stressed that dadeX must not become uncontrolled data collection; "Datenschutz und Datensicherheit" are "oberste Prämisse". The cabinet resolution also expressly contains the note that data collection must remain controlled.

By the end of 2029, the legal foundations are to be created so that all relevant registers – from the registration and criminal registers to the transparency database – are linked with one another and made accessible to authorities. Citizens would then no longer need to take action themselves in the event of a move or name change, because the responsible offices could communicate with one another. Business representatives praised in a press release above all the announced once-only principle, under which companies will also only need to transmit data once.

Concrete Relief for Everyday Life

Criticism and Reactions from Parliament

Further Steps in the National Council

While business representatives and parts of the reform coalition welcomed the plans, the reaction of the opposition was more reserved to dismissive. The FPÖ responded with mockery to the announcements. Secretary General Michael Schnedlitz stated in a press release: "Wer den Menschen angesichts von Rekordteuerung, Wirtschaftskrise und Sicherheitsrisiken das schnellere Bezahlen von Strafzetteln als Rettung präsentiert, hat jeden Bezug zur Lebensrealität verloren." The Greens remained cautious: digitalization spokesperson Süleyman Zorba called the interconnection of various registers "grundsätzlich sinnvoll" in principle, but wants to examine the concrete draft closely, especially with regard to data protection.

Outlook: What the Reform Will Specifically Deliver

Concrete Relief for Everyday Life

The government wants to launch a first bundle of measures before the summer of 2026. According to the cabinet resolution, applications are to be submitable digitally in the future without multiple paper copies, offices should accept not only cash payments, and citizens should no longer have to visit an office merely for payment processes or formal requirements. A working group of the reform partnership had previously identified corresponding "Digitalisierungshemmnisse" in numerous laws. For 2027/18, 15 million euros are budgeted for the project, according to the documents.

Further Steps in the National Council

Planned amendments to administrative jurisdiction, proposed by an expert group as part of the reform partnership between the federal government, states, and municipalities, are also to go into review in the coming days. Where administrative procedures provide no added value, they are to be eliminated entirely. From the government's perspective, digitalization is a core element in accelerating procedures for citizens and businesses overall, without abandoning in-person visits to the offices.

Outlook: What the Reform Will Specifically Deliver

Leichtfried, whose portfolio responsibility lies with the Ministry of the Interior, pointed out that personal visits to the authorities would continue to be possible. The digital offerings should expressly be a supplement, not a replacement. Pröll summed up the direction with the sentence: "Die Daten müssen laufen und nicht die Bürgerinnen und Bürger." This formulates the political aspiration: state procedures are to run in the background in the future and only become visible where citizens actually need them.

With the planned passage of the Administrative Procedure Act in the National Council, a parliamentary majority for the reform is emerging. It remains open how quickly the administration at the federal, state, and municipal levels can actually implement the new register connections and what costs will arise beyond the estimated 15 million euros. The debate on the data protection details is also likely to continue in the coming weeks.

At the same time, the reform is embedded in the ongoing reform partnership between the federal government, states, and municipalities. Their working group had scrutinized numerous regulations in recent months and repeatedly pointed to practical hurdles, such as requirements for handwritten signatures, personal appearances, or the repeated submission of identical documents. With the measures now announced, the government is taking up these proposals and intends to implement them step by step by the end of the decade.

Overall, one of the most extensive administrative reforms of recent years is taking shape. It combines technical modernization – the expansion of dadeX and new digital assistants – with a fundamental political debate about the relationship between the state and its citizens. The fact that the reform is intended to have an effect beyond the end of the current legislative period underscores the government's claim to initiate not only short-term relief, but a structural change.