Press release from ALTER-EU
read press release online:
http://media.corporateeurope.org/civicrm/mailing/view?reset=1&id=544
MANDATORY EU LOBBY TRANSPARENCY SUNKEN BY EU INSTITUTIONS
NEGOTIATIONS TO IMPROVE THE EU TRANSPARENCY REGISTER OFFICIALLY HAVE NOW
OFFICIALLY COLLAPSED [1], AS THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT, COMMISSION AND THE EU
COUNCIL FAILED TO ADVANCE THE ISSUE DURING TWO AND A HALF YEARS OF
DISCUSSIONS. THE DISAPPOINTMENT IS ESPECIALLY BIG SINCE EU PARLIAMENTARIANS
HAD JUST VOTED FOR GREATER LOBBY TRANSPARENCY IN JANUARY THIS YEAR.
MARGARIDA SILVA, TRANSPARENCY RESEARCHER AT ALTER-EU MEMBER GROUP CORPORATE
EUROPE OBSERVATORY COMMENTED:
"Corporate lobbies in the EU are ever-better funded and keep intensifying
their attempts to skew EU policy-making in their interest, but the current
transparency system is still voluntary and full of loopholes. The inability
of Commission, Parliament and Council to agree on a way to tackle this is a
miserable political failure.
"During the past two and a half years, we saw member states in the EU
Council refusing any binding commitments for the institution, the
Parliament dragged its feet, delaying the whole process, and the Commission
remained unwilling to compromise on its original proposal.
"The collapse of the talks is particularly a blow for the Commission's
Vice-President Timmermans, who in 2014 had loudly and proudly promised to
bring about a mandatory register. As citizens are getting ready to vote
next month, how will the EU Commission explain yet another lobby
transparency failure?"
MYRIAM DOUO, FROM ALTER-EU MEMBER GROUP FRIENDS OF THE EARTH EUROPE ADDED:
"After two and half years of negotiations, we can now only urge the three
Institutions to unilaterally introduce concrete improvements and not throw
the entire process out of the window.
"We urge them to make it a priority to continue the negotiations
immediately after the elections.
The revision of the EU Transparency Register is now long overdue: the EU
transparency system, and more importantly, the trust of citizens, cannot
wait another four years of delay.
***ENDS***
NOTES TO EDITORS:
*
ALTER-EU has been collecting examples of the shortfalls of the current
lobby transparency rules. You can see them in our series Lobby Scene
Investigation [2].
*
The European Commission published its proposal for an Inter-Institutional
Agreement to reform the Transparency Register in September 2016.
ALTER-EU analysed the proposal at the time: [3]At its essence, the
European Commission set out to make the Transparency Register mandatory by
extending the so-called "no registration, no meeting" to members of the
European Parliament and to the Permanent Representations holding the EU
Presidency. It had no proposal to extend this rule within the Commission.
*
The Council of the European Union adopted its own negotiating mandate in
2017, which only allowed for permanent representations the option of
adopting the rules on a voluntary basis. Here is ALTER-EU's analysis [4].
*
The European Parliament's own negotiating mandate which while very positive
in content, only allowed for voluntary commitments from MEPs [5]to not meet
with unregistered lobbies. But in January 2019, MEPs reformed the Rules of
Procedure to make it binding for rapporteurs, shadow rapporteurs and
committee chairs to publicly list their lobby meetings. Regretably, the
European Commission did not consider this was enough to re-start
negotiations.
CONTACT:
Margarida Silva, margarid [6]a...@corporateeurope.org, +32 2893 0930
Links:
------
[1]
http://media.corporateeurope.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=1693&qid=203289
[2]
http://media.corporateeurope.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=1694&qid=203289
[3]
http://media.corporateeurope.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=1695&qid=203289
[4]
http://media.corporateeurope.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=1696&qid=203289
[5]
http://media.corporateeurope.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=1697&qid=203289
[6]
http://media.corporateeurope.org/sites/all/modules/civicrm/extern/url.php?u=960&qid=148981
Alter-EU
Rue d'Edimbourg 26, 1050 Brussels, Belgium
Tel: +32-2-8931062 Mob: +32-497-509871
E-mail: k...@alter-eu.org
www.alter-eu.org
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