As the European Parliament prepares to adopt its position on a series of proposals in the European Union’s ‘Fit for 55’ package, several MEPs from the S&D, Renew Europe, Greens/EFA and The Left groups denounced recent attempts by some companies to influence votes during a debate in the Parliament’s plenary session in Strasbourg on Tuesday 7 June.
“Lobbying has been extraordinarily intense over the last few days in the European Parliament”, said Pascal Canfin (Renew Europe, France), chair of the Parliament’s Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI).
In an op-ed published in the newspaper Le Monde, he accused some companies of launching an “anti-climate offensive” as soon as it comes to moving from rhetoric to action, citing as examples the attempts to influence by Eurofer, an association representing the European steel sector, and by the car manufacturer BMW.
This pressure from some companies was also criticised by Philippe Lamberts (Belgium), co-president of the Greens/EFA.
“MEPs have been inundated with emails from industry lobbies, even getting invitations for dinners organised by lobbies up to the eve of the vote”, he wrote on Twitter in parallel to the debate between MEPs.
He went on to criticise the emergence of a “Conservative alliance led by the EPP” which, by joining forces with industry lobbies, is trying to “water down the Commission proposals even more”.
Sharing Mr Lamberts’ fears, Mohammed Chahim (S&D, the Netherlands), Parliament’s rapporteur on the creation of a ‘Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism’ (CBAM), called on his colleagues to “listen to our children and grandchildren and the voices of the young generations” rather than “reading the emails of lobbyists”.
On behalf of The Left, Manon Aubry (France), co-chair of the group, recalled how the lobbying of the company TotalEnergies “made us lose 30 years of action for the climate”.
She then urged her colleagues not to make “the same guilty mistake”, while denouncing the alignment of the right and the extreme right with the positions of big business.
Among the ‘Fit for 55’ issues that MEPs will vote on tomorrow (Wednesday 8 June - see EUROPE 12963/7), the three most heavily lobbied items are the reduction of the EU Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), the abolition of free allowances and the end of sales of new internal combustion cars and vans from 2035. (Original version in French by Damien Genicot)