During the time of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, our lands were ruled from Vienna. When you have interacted with the government, your request was sent by horse post to Vienna, where someone decided and sent you the response back. They had 30 days to do it. Now, more than a hundred years later, with our digital messages able to cross the world in less than a second, our government still maintains a 30-day limit for responses.
As mentioned, a month ago, I was reaching out to our state representatives. I’ve decided to give them all 30 days to respond before following up with the results.
On 20th August 2025, I wrote e-mails to all Czech representatives in the European Parliament. As listed below (with a party they’ve been voted in):
- Nikola Bartůšek - Přísaha
- Jaroslav Bžoch - ANO 2011
- Ivan David - Svoboda a přímá demokracie
- Klára Dostálová - ANO 2011
- Ondřej Dostál - Independent
- Jan Farský - Starostové a nezávislí
- Markéta Gregorová - Piráti
- Ondřej Knotek - ANO 2011
- Ondřej Kolár - TOP09 a Starostové
- Kateřina Konečná - Komunistická strana Čech a Moravy
- Ondřej Krutílek - Občanská demokratická strana
- Tomáš Kubín - ANO 2011
- Jana Nagyová - ANO 2011
- Danuše Nerudová - Starostové a nezávislí
- Luděk Niedermayer - TOP09 a Starostové
- Jaroslava Pokorná Jermanová - ANO 2011
- Filip Turek - Motoristé sobě
- Alexandr Vondra - Občanská demokratická strana
- Veronika Vrecionová - Občanská demokratická strana
- Tomáš Zdechovský - Křesťanská a demokratická unie - Československá strana lidová
I wasn’t holding my hopes high, and it was summer holidays - the European Parliament was closed until 25th August. But I was still disappointed.
The first reply I received was from Ondřej Dostál, just minutes after I sent my e-mail - it was an out-of-office message, explaining the summer closure of the parliament. He later replied on the 29th, agreeing that it should be stopped.
Second to reply was Jan Farský, who replied just three hours later, at 21:22 on the same day. He liked my arguments and wanted to use them himself. He also suggested contacting our Minister of Justice, Eva Decroix, who participates in the negotiations.
Third to reply was Markéta Gregorová, a day later. Her reply was basically a template, as it seems many people are contacting her about the same issue, and she’s trying to be efficient with her time.
So, that’s all. I’ve received replies from three out of twenty Czech members of the European Parliament. I have no idea why the rest of them never replied, whether they agree with the Chat Control proposal or didn’t care about the e-mails they’re getting. But the same can be said about Eva Decroix, who also never replied, but who knows, maybe I’m just below their recognition level.
In the meantime, our prime minister officially announced that my homeland will oppose the Danish proposal. But it might not be enough, there are many countries that still wants to peek into all of your messages and e-mails.
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