The European Ombudsman found, on Thursday 15 July, following an own-initiative enquiry opened in February 2021, that the European Defence Agency (EDA) should have forbidden its former Chief Executive Jorge Domecq from becoming a strategic adviser at Airbus Defence and Space.
The former Chief Executive left EDA in January 2020 to become a strategic advisor for Airbus Defence and Space, but also responsible for public affairs at Airbus Spain. While the Agency has approved his new duties, it has set conditions. These included that the former Chief Executive should refrain from any contact with the Airbus office in Brussels on matters concerning the EDA until 31 January 2022 and, during the same period, that he should not take part in any Airbus decision concerning the EDA’s activities and that he cannot lobby the Agency’s staff until 31 January 2021.
According to the Ombudsman, these conditions were insufficient when measured against the risks of lobbying, as they could not be monitored and enforced. She also found that the EDA was not thorough enough in its assessment of the risk of conflict of interest.
“The EDA should have applied stronger conditions, and forbidden its former Chief Executive from becoming a strategic adviser to Airbus Defence and Space, the post giving rise to the greatest risk”, says a statement from the Ombudsman. The Ombudsman found that not doing so amounted to maladministration.
In future, the EDA should forbid its senior staff from taking up positions where there is a clear conflict of interest and it should also set out criteria for forbidding such moves and any applicants for senior posts should be informed about the criteria, recommends the Ombudsman.
The Agency was also asked to ensure that the form for those applying for authorisation for intended jobs is drafted so that the EDA gets all the relevant information it needs at the outset. Indeed, the Ombudsman’s investigation showed that, for most of the 30-day period during which the EDA was assessing the applications for employment at Airbus, it did not have all the relevant information.
See the Ombudsman’s recommendation: https://bit.ly/3erOg6p (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)