LOBBYING LANDSCAPE IN FRANCE

Generally speaking there is a lack of quantitative or qualitative information available on lobbying actors in France. Nevertheless parliamentary registers as well as the list of members of lobbyists’ associations : Association Française des Cabinets de Lobbying (AFCL), Network BASE (Business Action and European Strategy, Association professionnelle des Responsables des relations avec les Pouvoirs publics (ARPP), Association des Avocats Lobbyistes (AAL) allow the gathering of a few information. Yet, it is impossible today to quantify with precision the real number of interest representatives carrying out lobbying activity in France.

The new register of the National Assembly that was put online on 1st January 2014 identifies as of 1st September 2014 162 organisations (40 enterprises, 37 associations of enterprises, 27 consulting firms, 28 representative organisations, 17 civil society organisations, 7 public or semi-public bodies, 5 public enterprises and 1 think tank.

The total budget declared by these organisations is between € 14 and 18, 2 million. In total 733 persons hold a card of representation of interests or participate in activities that fall within the scope of the register.

In the Senate only 97 representatives of interests are registered as of September 2014. Registration takes place on an annual basis but nothing is foreseen to remind interest representatives that their registration must be renewed. Out of the 97 registered representatives, 44 of them do not appear on the register of the National Assembly out of which are 23 representative organisations (namely association of elected officials and of professional federations), 8 public bodies, 9 enterprises, 3 consulting companies and 1 association.

These low figures must be put in perspective with an original study published in March 2011 by Transparency France and Regards Citoyens based on reports published by the National Assembly between 2007 and 2010. The study identified 4 635 organisations, represented by  15 447 personnes, mentioned in annex to parliamentary reports. Almost half of the hearings organised by deputies concerned public or semi-public actors . However, the latter are not compelled to register. To the extent that 62% of the identified reports did not indicate the list of the auditioned persons, it can be considered from this sole point of view that their number is considerably higher. Especially given that hearings represent only a part of the channels that lobbying can use. Another study made in 2011 by students at Sciences Po for Transparency France also identified on the basis of information provided on the websites of lobbyists’ associations, 47 consulting firms. To these 47 specialised consultancies must be added some public relations firms that often have a department dedicated to public affairs well as law firms that are engaged more and more in lobbying activities. In 2014, l’Association des avocats lobbyistes (Association of lawyer lobbyists), created in 2011, counts 21 members (law firms or lawyers). Regarding in-house interest representatives, the ARPP counted in 2011 58 enterprises and 56 professional organisations.

Given the absence of exhaustive information on lobbying actors, it is difficult to precisely establish the real or supposed influence of the different categories of actors on the elaboration of public policies.

The study undertaken by Transparency France with Regards citoyens on the influence at the National Assembly, allows the identification of certain trends even if it reveals only the emerged part of the numerous forms that lobbying takes. It only pertains to the National Assembly.

According to this study, almost half (48,3%) of the 9 302 identified hearings concerned representatives of the public or semi-public sector. Among them almost half (44,8%) belonged to the different civil service bodies (national, territorial or foreign) consulted as experts in administration. Thus civil servants represent 21,6 % of all auditions. They are followed by representative organisations (professional associations, trade unions, consular chambers, association of elected officials...), then the private economic sector composed of enterprises, associations of enterprises (20,9%). Also to be added are public enterprises (2,9%). Compared to the proportion of other organisations of civil society (non-profit associations and foundations or 7,5%), the positions of enterprises seem to be heard more by parliamentarians.

Depending on the sector concerned, the categories of actors consulted by the public decision makers may vary. The study on the influence at the National Assembly reveals that public bodies are the first type of actor auditioned by deputies and this applies for most of the 30 themes addressed in the reports of the National Assembly.

For certain issues the categories of actors can nevertheless be distinguished. Representative organisations are in majority for the following issues:  education (53,2%), civil service  (45,6%, equal with public bodies ), sport (45,5%) and women (39,4%). Compared with the global average the private sector is proportionally more present in issues pertaining to the Internet (44,6%), economy (37,8%), energy (34,3%), environment (29,7%), media (29,2%),  culture (28%) and transport  (25,5%). For the first two issues, the private sector comes first. Civil society organisations are more present on issues dealing with veterans (31,6%), development aid  (27,6%), society (18,5%) and women (15,2%). By comparison they only represent but 9,3% of the auditioned actors on matters dealing with the environment. They are less heard on issues dealing with agriculture (5,8%), economy (5,1%), defense (2%), transport (2,8%), labour and employment (2,8%) or research (2,1%).

In terms of lobbying framework France is strangely characterized by the existence of two different systems in Parliament : One at the National Assembly and the other at the Senate and by the quasi absence of rules in other places of public decision making. Furthermore integrity frameworks are different from a category of public actors to another. Given the separation of powers the rules of conduct applicable to public agents depend on laws and regulations that are different from those applicable to parliamentarians. The other places of public decision making (central administration, ministries, ministerial cabinets, advisors to the President of the Republic, expert agencies, independent authorities, local authorities) have at this time no rules specifically dedicated to lobbying.

If rules governing lobbying and transparency of public life are beginning to emerge, such rules are still very heterogeneous from one institution to the other.

There is no law that defines and regulates lobbying activities in France. Neither is legislative footprint a practice widely spread within French institutions.

If rules relative to lobbying exist at the National Assembly and the Senate, they only concern but a small part of the relations between interest representatives and parliamentarians. More important still is the control of the effective respect of the rules in reality (25% at the National Assembly and  6% at the Senate) and no trigger mechanism that can be actuated by citizens, has been introduced.

Regarding access to information a law provides since 1978 the right of access to administrative documents but the law remains ignored and poorly applied. Beside this law does not apply to legislative documents and other parliamentary works. The websites of the National Assembly and the Senate nevertheless allow the possibility and increasingly so to follow parliamentary work (agenda of sessions and meetings of committees, list of amendments, reports of debates, videos …). An effort must still be made to publish such information in an open format so they can be reutilized and in real time.

There are no rules for parliamentarians after their mandate has expired. They can continue to provide counselling services (and therefore lobbying) during their mandate provided they provided such services before the beginning of their mandate or become business lawyers during their mandate. For the other public officials on the other hand there is a framework governing their entry into the private sector. There is a cooling off period of three years between the end of civil service activity and the entry into an enterprise the person was charged previously to monitor or control. This prohibition applies to all public agents including advisors to ministerial cabinets and the Élysée and since the law on transparency to all members of government and of the main local executive authorities. However, in practice, this prohibition is not always respected because its application is relatively complex.

For their part interest representatives are in general rather favourable to self-regulation (50%). In the last twenty years, they have adopted their own codes of conduct via primarily through their professional associations. Enterprises are also developing and making public responsible lobbying charts.

Finally, regarding matters pertaining to equitable access, France has still a long way to go. Formal consultation procedures do exist but they are very heterogeneous, for example from one ministry to the other and complex. Several laws and decrees provide the organisation of consultation by administrative authorities or via consultative commissions and public consultation via the Internet. The major weaknesses are that such consultations often come to late, without any time limit for reply and with opinions often not taken very much into consideration.  Received contributions are not often made public. The administration and the initiators of consultation do not have an obligation to indicate which arguments have been or not have been taken into consideration (no follow up right), which can discourage actors to participate in consultative or participative processes. Finally, when consultations are organised, the balance of the interests represented is not sufficiently guaranteed. (10%).

At the Parliament, consultations are most of the time organised for texts being prepared. However, since there is no formalised procedure, conditions for consultation are not clear which makes it difficult for a true participation of a large number of actors of civil society or of citizens in the elaboration of laws and public policies (25%).

Recommendations (TI)

Rules to be defined for public decision makers and public places and public expertise.

1. Systematize the organisation of transparent and harmonised public consultation favouring the access of civil society.
2. Publish the positions, arguments and other elements of information received by public decision makers
3. Make public the list of all persons and organisations consulted for the drafting of a report or the preparation of a text.
4. Put on line the agenda of the meetings between public decision makers and interest representatives.
5. Ensure the application of effective rules governing the revolving door and extent it in an adapted manner to parliamentarians.
6. Establish a joint supervisory body that can be seized by citizens, namely in case of false declarations on the register or derivatives like the complaint mechanism of the Transparency Register at EU level.

 Specific Rules for Parliament

1. Establish joint rules relative to lobbying in both chambers in their house rules.
2. Increase the transparency of parliamentary clubs as well as symposia so-called ‘parliamentary symposia’ by making it an obligation to describe conducted activities and sources of financing.
3. Create a status for Assistants and have them comply with the same ethics rules applied to parliamentarians, namely the prohibition to receive compensation or advantages by third parties for activities of lobbying, consulting or parliamentary monitoring.

Rules to define for interest representatives

1. Register one’s commitments, practices and lobbying processes in one’s societal responsibility ; conduct one’s actions of lobbying in coherence with the commitments made regarding the CSR and towards other stakeholders.
2. Adopt and make public a chart of responsible lobbying applicable to all employees and third parties carrying out lobbying activities on behalf of an organisation.
3. Make public the main positions communicated to public decision makers.
4. Abstain from any political mandate at national or European level or any function of assistant parliamentarian, ministerial advisor or national or international civil service post in parallel to a mission of interest representative.
5. Refrain from recruiting former  public decision makers before the end of the cooling off period, mandating or compensating persons who perform public duties to represent or favour one’s interests.
6. Not disseminate information that are deliberately biased and ensure to the public decision makers that the information or arguments provided are reliable, true and up to date.
7. Ensure the financial transparency of one’s activities of lobbying.