Brussels, 15/04/2015 (Agence Europe) - A new report published by the NGO Transparency International on Wednesday 15 April reveals that EU countries are still not doing enough to regulate lobbying and, indeed, none of those assessed adequately control the revolving door between public and private sectors.
Transparency International assessed practices in 19 member states and their collective average score, based on criteria of integrity, promotion of transparency and equality of access, was 31%. The European institutions fare slightly better, recording an average of 36%.
On the criteria of transparency (interactions between lobbyists and public officials are made transparent and are open to public scrutiny), integrity (clear and enforceable rules on ethical conduct are in place for both lobbyists and public officials) and equality of access (public decision-making is open to the widest possible range of interests), it is Slovenia which comes out on top (55%), largely because of its recent dedicated lobbying regulation, but it, too, suffers from gaps and loopholes.
Hungary and Cyprus perform worst (14%), scoring particularly badly on access to information. Italy, Portugal and Spain are among the five worst-performing countries. Transparency International flags up the close links between public and financial sectors.
Of the 19 countries studied, only seven, Transparency International notes, have some form of dedicated lobbying law or regulation (Austria, France, Ireland, Lithuania, Poland, Slovenia and United Kingdom).
“Cooling-off” period required. Transparency International notes that none of the EU countries or EU institutions assessed has any provision for adequately controlling the revolving door between public and private sectors. MEPs are mostly exempt from pre- and post-employment restrictions and “cooling-off” periods. The NGO calls for minimum “cooling-off” periods to be established or amended before former public and elected officials can work in lobbying positions that may create conflicts of interest. In Portugal, 54% of all cabinet posts have been filled by bankers since 1974. In its recommendations, Transparency International calls for obligatory registers of lobbyists and for “files” to be established to track and publish which external input has influenced legislation and what contact has taken place between lobbyists and public officials. (Solenn Paulic)