Dissatisfied with the Commission's reply to his letter about the contract obtained by the US investment firm BlackRock to carry out a study on the integration of environmental and social factors in the supervision of banks (see EUROPE 12469/30), MEP Damien Carême (Greens/EFA, France) said, on Wednesday 10 June, that he would again refer the matter to the European Ombudsman.
At the end of April, the Ombudsman had not followed up on an initial complaint from the MEP, stating that it was necessary first to have formally referred the matter to the institution concerned and to have tried to resolve the conflict through this channel (see EUROPE 12478/37). It is has now been done and the Commission's response falls far short of allaying the MEP’s concerns.
In its letter, the Commission further explains that BlackRock assured the Commission that it would ensure “physical segregation” between the departments in charge of the study and those in charge of investments within the company. “But who can seriously believe this? And how will the Commission be able to verify this?!” asked the outraged MEP.
Damien Carême did not budge: the only way to resolve this conflict of interest is to cancel the contract and re-tender it.
The MEP also asked the Ombudsman to check the explanations given by BlackRock on the price of its bid (€280,000), which he suspects was deliberately set very low to ensure that it could influence the public decision.
On this point, the Commission assured that it had already carried out the necessary checks. “Given the technical quality of BlackRock’s offer, it would have been the most economically advantageous offer even had the price offered been much higher”, it says.
See Commission letter: https://bit.ly/30sQ9d3 (Original version in French by Marion Fontana)