TRANSPARENCY, INTEGRITY AND ACCOUNTABILITY IN THE EU INSTITUTIONS

The European Parliament appointed Sven Giegold as Rapporteur for an initiative report for transparency, integrity and accountability in the EU institutions. Here below is the Draft Report (2015/2041 (INI) Committee on Constitutional Affairs

Subjects Covered

1. Introducing a legislative footprint, making the lobby register as mandatory as possible
2. Transparency, accountability and integrity in dealing with lobbyists
3. Defending integrity against conflicts of interest
4. Cooling off periods to insure integrity among office holders and staff
5. Balanced composition of Expert Groups
6. Integrity by independent control over financing of European Political Parties
7. Fully realising access to documents
8. Transparency for accountability in the legislative process
9. Transparency of the external representation and negotiations of the EU
10. Transparency and accountability of economic governance in the eurozone
11. Protection of whistleblowers, fight against corruption
12. Strengthening parliamentary accountability of the Commission and its agencies 

1. Introducing a legislative footprint, making the lobby register as mandatory as possible

1. Believes European Commission, Parliament and Council should record and disclose all input received from lobbyists/interest representatives on draft policies, laws and amendments as a ‘legislative footprint’; suggests that this legislative footprint consists of a form annexed to reports detailing all the lobbyists with whom those in charge of a particular file have met in the process of drawing up the report and a second element listing all written input received;

2. Calls on the European Commission to expand and improve its existing initiative as laid out in its recent Decision of 25 November 2014 on the publication of information on meetings held between Members of the Commission and organisations or self-employed individuals. The recording of meeting data should be expanded to everyone involved in the EU’s policy-making process;

3. Calls on the Commission to make all information on lobby influence easily accessible for the public through one centralised online database;

4. Considers among the Members of the European Parliament those appointed Rapporteur or Committee President to hold special responsibility to be transparent on their contact with lobbyists due to their role in EU legislation;

5. Suggests to amend the Code of Conduct as to make mandatory for Rapporteurs and Committee President to adopt the same practise of exclusively meeting registered lobbyists and publish these meetings online and rapporteurs to publish a legislative footprint;

6. Believes an amendment should introduce mandatory monthly updates on lobby expenditures;

7. Reiterates its longstanding call to back up the EU lobby register with a legal act to close all loopholes and achieve a fully mandatory register for all lobbyists. The proposal for this legal act could take into account the progress achieved by changes in the interinstitutional agreement and the Parliament's Code of Conduct;

8. Reiterates its call to the Council to join the lobby register as soon as possible.

2. Transparency, accountability and integrity in dealing with lobbyists

9. Considers lobby transparency through monthly reporting by lobbyists about their meetings as a key element for future EU legislation;

10. Considers that, when interpreting ‘inappropriate behaviour’ within the meaning of point (b) of the Code of Conduct, this expression includes to turn down formal invitations to hearings or committees with no sufficient reason;

11. Insists that registered law firms should declare in the lobby register all clients on whose behalf they perform covered activities;

12. Asks the bureau to restrict access to European Parliament premises for non-registered organisations or individuals by making all visitors to its premises sign a declaration that they are not lobbyists falling into the scope of the register or otherwise declare their registration;

13. Believes it to be urgently necessary to introduce a proper monitoring system for submitted information to ensure that the information that registrants provide is meaningful, accurate, up-to-date and comprehensive;

14. Believes at least 5% of declarations should be checked each year;

15. Believes that representations of national, regional and local governments should not fall under the EU lobby register if they have their own mandatory lobby register and do not offer workspace for private or corporate actors within their representations.

3. Defending integrity against conflicts of interest

16. Believes the members of the Advisory Committee chosen among Members of the European Parliament should be complemented by a majority of externally chosen members who have to be qualified experts in the field of ethics regulation and should be drawn from an open call including members from civil society;

17. Believes the Code of Conduct should be amended to empower the enlarged Advisory Committee to adopt final decisions instead of the president;

18. Believes Rules of Procedure should be amended regarding declarations of financial interest of members to task the Advisory Committee and the supportive administration with factual checks in samples and to empower them to ask for proof where necessary;

19. Believes article 3 of the Code of Conduct for MEPs should be rephrased to include a clear ban on MEPs holding side jobs or other paid work that could lead to a conflict of interest;

20. Believes MEPs should have their remuneration by Parliament reduced by half of what they earn from any outside activity if as employee or self-employed in parallel to their office as MEP.

4. Cooling off periods to insure integrity among office holders and staff

21. Believes the Code of Conduct should be amended to include a cooling off period for Members to work in lobbying in the field of their parliamentary responsibilities for 3 years;

22. Believes for Members of the European Commission the so called ‘cooling off period’ should be extended to 3 years; and a cooling off period of 2 years should also apply to all Commission's staff involved in the drafting or implementation of EU legislation or treaties, including contracted staff.

5. Balanced composition of Expert Groups

23. Welcomes the Commission's intention to follow up on the Ombudsman’s recommendations against conflicts of interest in expert groups;

24. Supports the Ombudsman’s demand to require registration in the lobby register for appointment to expert groups as long as these members are not government officials or receive their income otherwise overwhelmingly exclusively from a state institutions such as universities.

6. Integrity by independent control over financing of European Political Parties

25. Considers control by the European Parliament over the financing of European Political Parties an unnecessary conflict of interest;

26. Calls to hand the control over financing of European Political Parties to a neutral body.

7. Fully realising access to documents

27. Calls for citizen to have the same right of appeal when requesting for information as they enjoy when requesting specific documents;

28. Deems exemplary by Parliament to list as online register all available documents and calls on Commission and Council to follow this example for all their documents;

29. Considers that regulation 1049/2001 should be urgently updated as demanded by the Treaty of Lisbon by widening its scope to encompass all EU institutions, bodies, offices and agencies currently not covered, such as the European Council, the European Central Bank, the European Court of Justice, Europol and Eurojust;

30. Requests the Commission to make sure those non-EU actors who receive EU money should be as accountable as EU institutions would be themselves when spending the money;

31. Believes that the rights of access to documents of the Parliament towards other EU institutions can never be regarded as weaker than of individual citizens through regulation 1049/2001.

8. Transparency for accountability in the legislative process

32. Regrets that a lack of transparency of the Council hinders citizens and national parliaments to hold governments accountable due to a lack of information on individual Member State’s positions;

33. Believes therefore preparatory meetings within the Council should be as public as Committee meetings of the European Parliament;

34. Believes Parliament Committees’ chairs should publish minutes and all documents used in trialogues proactively;

35. Calls on the Presidency of the Council to include all trialogue documents in the documents register to allow for access according to EU regulation 1049/2001.

9. Transparency of the external representation and negotiations of the EU

36. Is of the opinion that MEPs should have access to all documents of the Commission, where necessary under exceptional circumstances through a reading room;

37. Deems it unacceptable that European Parliament has less or less open access to documents in trade negotiations than some members of national parliaments;

38. Calls on the Commission to put into practise all recommendations of the Ombudsman for more transparency of trade negotiations;

39. Recognises progress in the transparency of trade negotiations, but insists that these advances for TTIP have to be extended to all trade negotiations;

40. Believes the Commission while engaged in trade negotiations should publish the negotiation mandates, all negotiating positions, all requests and offers and all consolidated draft negotiation texts prior to each negotiation round, so that the European and national parliaments, as well as civil society organisations and the wider public, can make recommendations on them before the negotiations are closed for comments and the agreement goes to ratification;

41. Calls on the Commission to propose an inter-institutional agreement to codify those principles for all trade negotiations.

10. Transparency and accountability of economic governance in the eurozone

42. Believes decisions taken or prepared in the Eurogroup, in the Economic and Financial Committee, “informal” EcoFin meetings and Euro summits have to become transparent and accountable including through the publication of minutes;

11. Protection of whistleblowers, fight against corruption

43. Regrets the Ombudsman's finding that most EU institutions have not yet properly implemented rules to protect whistleblowers; by now only European Commission, European Ombudsman and European Court of Auditors have adopted such rules;

44. Believes effective whistleblower protection to be a key weapon against corruption and therefore reiterates its call to the Commission to prepare a whistleblower protection directive including minimum standards of protection all over Europe;

45. Believes the ongoing review of EU election law should include a rule that those persons found guilty of corruption against the EU’s financial interest or within member states cannot run for office in the next 2 terms of the European Parliament;

46. Believes for at least 3 years those persons or companies led or owned by such persons who are found guilty of corruption in the EU should not be allowed to enter into procurement contracts with the European Union or be allowed to profit from EU funds.

12. Strengthening parliamentary accountability of the Commission and its agencies

47. Calls on the Commission to draw up a framework regulation for all EU agencies granting Parliament co-decision on the election or dismissal of directors of such agencies as well as direct rights to question and hear them;

48. Supports national parliaments in inviting Commissioners to question them.