News
BackFollowing a certain amount of preparatory work in form of workshops and consultations, the Draft Report, which addresses the issues of 'Lobbying in the EU', ‘Transparency of political processes’ and ‘Accountability of EU Officials’, was discussed in the Committee for the first time yesterday. The interest of citizens in the subject was great; many comments and proposals had been received.
Proposed Key Measures
- Clear rules for lobbying – the “legislative footprint“: this shall make it possible to see for every EU legislative act, which stakeholders/lobbyists had meetings with policymakers and/or who has proposed texts. This would require that officials would only meet registered lobbyists and make any such meeting public (a practical tool for this purpose has already been developed, which is already used by some MEPs).
- Conflicts of interest and sideline jobs of MEPs: currently, the decision whether any additional income is admissible or whether a conflict of interest exists, is made by other MEPs and the President of Parliament. However, these were biased when making decisions relating to colleagues; therefore, external experts had to be involved in the decision-making process.
- Cooling-off periods: the problem of the “revolving door”, i.e. alternating between public functions and the private (lobby) sector had to be remedied: it is unacceptable that former high-ranking political officials take up positions in private companies where they exploit their expertise and contacts. This had to be resolved by cooling-off periods of three years, during which Members may not engage in activities in the same sector.
- End to secret meetings: the transparency of the EU Council had to be improved. The Eurogroup for example, does not publish any negotiation minutes; the important negotiations in the trilogues (between Council, Parliament and Commission) are also intransparent. It must be possible at least to see when these are taking place, who is taking part, and there should be minutes.
- Whistleblower protection: in future, suitable protection for officials, who expose lobbying practices, had to be provided in all institutions (it already exists with the commission, the Ombudsman and the Court of Auditors).
Discussion in the Committee
The discussion clearly showed the effort of all groups to stress their commitment for more transparency. However, there some doubts were also expressed. The Conservative side came with the somewhat lame argument that lobby registers and the publication of meetings between ordinary citizens and MEPs would complicate matters – however, the Regulation is not concerned with these. Apart from that, the Draft Report would in many respects go too far: secret negotiations (trilogues, international treaties) might be affected by publishing positions. The counter argument was that these were an obstacle to democratic interests. It should be possible, at least in the aftermath of any meetings, to read the minutes to find out the positions the various participating officials had represented in the negotiations.
Others voiced the opinion that these transparency rules would make EU institutions appear more undemocratic than these actually were; hence they would be responsible for provoking mistrust in the population in the first place. Some also referred to national Parliaments and governments and pointed out that these would have even more inadequate lobby control. However, these must not be used as excuses to prevent the exposure of intransparent and undemocratic lobby structures regarding EU institutions. The factions have until the end of February to table amendments. It will be interesting to see how much will remain of these ambitious proposals.
Further information: