The draft law of the Ministry of Digital Governance “Completion of the land registration, simplification of procedures, use of artificial intelligence and provisions for the operation of the n.p.d.d. “Hellenic Land Registry”, other provisions of the Ministry of Digital Governance”.

ND declared in favor of the principle of the bill. The opposition parties declared on principle, although they are voting on individual provisions.

Before the curtain fell on the debate, the Minister of Digital Governance Dimitris Papastergiou said that the cadastre is a huge project for the country, but it is also an extremely difficult task and the government, which took the last 5 years “brave decisions” to run the cadastre , today also brings new provisions that solve problems.

Mr. Papastergiou referred to the National Register of Communications and the central basis of unique registration of the contact information of all citizens, exclusively through which the corresponding data of the information systems of the public sector bodies are updated. “In this country we must know who we are and if the state needs to contact us, how it will do so. If we have a cell phone, we want it to send a message because something might happen. If we don’t have a mobile phone, we don’t exclude anyone, we ask to certify the residential address so that the state can deliver anything to you in a physical way”, said the minister and invited everyone to think about how many times citizens’ rights were lost because the state did not have addresses or the correct telephone numbers and how many times fines were imposed or increased for the same reason. Regarding the notification of documents to the citizen’s mailbox, the Minister of Digital Governance clarified that it does not concern judicial decisions but only administrative decisions and documents, i.e. it does not concern what is served by bailiffs. “This notification has the status of service and is very important for public bodies when they want to serve, for example, a fine for gross land. This thing was a Calvary for the municipalities,” said Mr. Papastergiou and emphasized that no citizen is excluded and if he has not registered a mobile phone, he will be able to receive the documents from the KEP. On the Person Authentication and Authorization System, he said that cybersecurity challenges have increased and now “a new system for multi-factor authentication is being launched as a safeguard for citizens using digital services.”

The Deputy Minister of Digital Governance, Kostas Kyranakis, said that the new provisions for the Land Registry, to a very large extent, solve, simply, understandably and many times also digitally, many problems that afflict many people. He also underlined that the bill introduces tools so that the citizen is not necessarily referred to the courts. Among the critical provisions, the deputy minister included those with which:

– if someone has been justified in an objection committee, against the forestry service, he can go to the land office two months after the decision, and the supervisor is obliged to return his real estate to him (article 15 “Correction of land registration in case of decision acceptance of objections against the forest map”)

-resolves the issue that arises if in the building identification, the property comes out with small deviations, in relation to the original measurement (Article 16 “Possibility of unilateral correction of contract details – Conditions and permissible deviations of area measurements”).

– for spatial changes, a system is created in which the engineers of the “Hellenic Land Registry” organization will have a dominant role, and a register of certified engineers is created so that in the areas where there is a large volume of spatial changes, they will also be able to issue decisions. From January, the process will be done digitally and the register will be active so that the citizen, quickly and digitally, for a spatial change that may have the consent of his neighbor, can go through it automatically. If he does not have consent, he will reach the certified engineer who will issue a decision which he can appeal.

Referring to the use of artificial intelligence, Kostas Kyranakis reiterated that the human factor remains dominant, the final say in decisions rests with the supervisor, who if he disagrees with the recommendation automatically generated by the artificial intelligence, will not have to justify his disagreement.

He also noted that throughout the previous period, the ministry recorded proposals from MPs of all parties and professional groups, and then proposed this bill with the aim of facilitating the citizens.