Bormann network? Barroso's revolving EU doors to Bilderberg
Old role: President of the European Commission (2004-2014)
New roles: Member of Steering Group of the
Bilderberg Conferences; Honorary Chairman of the
Honorary Committee of the European Business Summit; and others
http://www.bilderberg.org/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=7429
José Manuel Barroso has accepted, and been
authorised in, 22 new positions, including ten in
the academic world, plus roles in the arts, for
think tanks and with speakers' bureaux. Many,
although not all of these, are unpaid or honorary positions.
However, a number of his new roles raise
questions as to how they were handled, including
his membership of the steering group of the
Bilderberg Conferences; and his role as Honorary
Chairman of the Honorary Committee of the
European Business Summit. These are unpaid roles
and the Bilderberg role was passed to the Ad hoc
Ethical Committee for an opinion. However, we are
not clear how much consideration there was about
the nature of the Bilderberg conference. In
particular, there appears to have been little
reflection on the fact that as reported by The
Guardian last year: “Bilderberg is packed to the
gills with senior members of powerful lobby
groups” and is “big business. And big politics.
And big lobbying”. It seems a strange omission
not to have reminded Barroso about the ban on
lobbying in the context of his Bilderberg role.
Meanwhile, the Commission did not consider that
it even needed to formally authorise Barroso's
new role at the European Business Summit, due to
its honorary nature, despite the EBS being the
largest business lobby event in the Brussels
bubble calendar. It simply accepted having been
notified of the role. But what does being
Honorary Chairman of the Honorary Committee
actually mean? Is it having your name and photo
on the website, or something more? Does the
committee meet in person? The Commission never
clarified this. By contrast, it did go through a
formal authorisation process for Barroso's new
role as an (unpaid) member of the international
board of the Madrid Opera House!
It is not always possible to understand the
rationale of the Commission in its handling of
these roles: which ones they consider require
active authorisation or not, and which are passed
to the committee for an opinion, or not. For the
sake of clarity and transparency, in our view all
new roles, unpaid and paid, and whether
'honorary' or not, should be authorised.
We contacted José Manuel Barroso via the
University of Princeton prior to publishing this
report; no response was received. More
information:
http://corporateeurope.org/revolvingdoorwatch/cases/jos-manuel-barroso
or in our spreadsheet.
The revolving doors spin again
http://www.corporateeurope.org/revolving-doors/2015/10/revolving-doors-spin-again?
Barroso II commissioners join the corporate sector
October 28th 2015 Revolving doors
Summary
One in three (9 out of 26) outgoing commissioners
who left office in 2014 have gone through the
'revolving door' into roles in corporations or
other organisations with links to big business,
leading to fears of an unhealthily close
relationship between the EU's executive body and
private interests, according to a new rpeort
(press release here). In our view, at least eight
revolving door roles, held by four commissioners,
should not have received authorisation at all,
due to the risk of possible conflicts of
interest. These are: authorisation of
ex-commissioner (and now MEP) Viviane Reding to
sit on the boards of the mining company Nyrstar
1, Agfa Gevaert, and the Bertelsmann Foundation
(which has strong ties to the global media giant
of the same name), and Siim Kallas to provide
consultancy to IT company Nortal. Meanwhile,
other members of the Barroso II Commission (which
handled the fallout from the global financial
crash of the late noughties) are now on the
payroll of Bank of America Merrill Lynch (Neelie
Kroes) and a major private equity firm CVC and
wealth management firm Merit Capital (Karel De
Gucht). Former Trade Commissioner De Gucht, who
started the EU-US trade negotiations TTIP, has
also received the blessing of the current
Commission to join the telecoms company Belgacom
(now known as Proximus) 2. Additionally, the
former Commission President José Manuel Barroso
himself has taken on new roles at the corporate
lobby-fests of the European Business Summit and Bilderberg Conference.
This, however, is not a new problem. In 2011
Corporate Europe Observatory, LobbyControl, and
others via the Alliance for Lobbying Transparency
and Ethics Regulation (ALTER-EU) demanded better
rules to tackle the revolving door after a series
of scandals involving previous commissioners. We
were told by the Barroso II Commission that its
reformed rules reflect “best practice in Europe
and in the world”. But the analysis in this
report about the departing members of the second
Barroso Commission, shows that the revolving door
rules remain inadequate and poorly implemented.
Introduction
The tight-knit world of politicians, civil
servants, industrialists, and lobbyists known as
the 'Brussels bubble' lends itself to unhealthily
close relationships between regulators and the
regulated. Add in the phenomenon of the revolving
door between the public and private sectors, and
there is great potential for conflicts of
interest. The revolving door reflects one aspect
of the corporate capture of the EU decision-making process.
In the hierarchy of EU decision-makers the 28
European commissioners, one for each of the
member states, would probably be regarded as the
most important. Individually and collectively
they are responsible for initiating and
negotiating laws and regulations affecting 500
million citizens. It was therefore shocking to
see the way in which five out of thirteen
departing commissioners who served in the first
Barroso Commission (2004-2010) spun through the
revolving door into problematic new roles when
they left office. Former commissioners, who
collectively had just been handling the fall-out
from the financial and economic crises, joined
the boards of insurance giant Munich Re, bank BNP
Paribas, and mortgage and life insurance company Credimo, to name just a few.
Most notoriously, Charlie McCreevy who had been
the Commissioner for the Internal Market joined
the derivatives trading unit of global
investments company BNY Mellon, the board of
Ryanair, and the board of Sentenial which offers
payment technology to banks. Meanwhile, Günter
Verheugen, the former Commissioner for Enterprise
and Industry, founded consultancy firm the
European Experience Company with his former Head
of Cabinet, joined the international advisory
board of lobby consultancy FleishmanHillard and
became Senior Advisor and Vice Chairman of global
banking and markets in Europe, Middle East and
Africa at the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) Niederlassung Deutschland.
The furore that resulted was immense. Over 50,000
people signed a petition organised by the
Alliance for Lobbying Transparency and Ethics
Regulation (ALTER-EU) to demand action to block
the revolving door. Eventually the rules,
contained in the Code of Conduct for
Commissioners, were reformed and mild
improvements were introduced. See annex for a
detailed explanation of the current rules.
Yet, despite this, as this report illustrates,
the problem of the revolving door has continued
as the Barroso II Commission left office.
Corporate Europe Observatory has demonstrated how
attempts by corporations and corporate lobby
groups to influence EU policies were more
successful than ever under the Barroso II
Commission, in part due to a close relationship
with the Commission. CEO's Black Book showed how
the Barroso II Commission came to act on behalf
of corporations whether it was in the fields of
climate, agriculture and food, or finance,
economic and fiscal policies. The questions this
report set out to answer are: to what extent has
this corporate capture continued, via the
revolving door, and how effective have the revised rules been in preventing it?
The new roles of the Barroso II Commission in 10 factoids
We have pulled together a spreadsheet of the new
roles taken on by departing members of the
Barroso II Commission. It has been collated from
information in the College of Commissioners'
published minutes, from access to document
requests, and from other public sources. It is
the only such spreadsheet publicly available.
Here is a digested summary (all figures correct
as of 23 October 2015):There have been a total of
26 departing Barroso II commissioners with a
total of 117 post-Commission roles between them.
Of these 117, 98 have been formally authorised,
of which 37 (38 per cent) were considered by the Ad hoc Ethical Committee.
One in three (9 out of 26) outgoing commissioners
who left office in 2014 have gone through the
'revolving door' into roles in corporations or
other organisations with links to big business.
Four commissioners have taken at least eight
roles between them which should have been rejected outright by the Commission.
Not a single application for authorisation by the
Commission has been rejected (as of 1 October 2015).
There have been 3 withdrawn requests, 2 by
Androulla Vassiliou and 1 by Connie Hedegaard.
The Commission has so far refused to provide any
further information on the roles involved in
these withdrawals, but they occurred after
opinions were provided by the Ad hoc Ethical
Committee. For her part, Vassiliou has confirmed
that the committee's opinion was that there might
be conflicts of interest arising in her two
proposed roles; she therefore decided to reject
the offers and not proceed with seeking Commission authorisation.
Some corporations connected with former commissioners' new roles include:
Agfa-Gevaert (Viviane Reding);
Bank of America Merrill Lynch (Neelie Kroes);
Belgacom / Proximus 2 (Karel De Gucht);
Bertelsmann (Viviane Reding);
CVC Partners (Karel De Gucht);
Enel (Joaquín Almunia);
Merit Capital (Karel De Gucht);
Nortal (Siim Kallas);
Nyrstar 1 (Viviane Reding);
Syngenta (Janez Potocnik)
The busiest former commissioner is José Manuel
Barroso with 22 notified new roles.
The most popular new role is as a member of the
board of the corporate-friendly think-tank
Friends of Europe. Four commissioners sought
authorisation for this role: László Andor, Andris
Piebalgs, Androulla Vassiliou and Joaquín
Almunia. A further three, Štefan Füle, Michel
Barnier and Dacian Ciolo?, are also listed on the Friends of Europe website.
Štefan Füle has yet to apply for authorisation
for any new role (as of 7 August 2015), despite
also joining the Central European Strategy
Council’s International Advisory Board.
Departed commissioners still operating within the
new Commission: Siim Kallas, Dacian Ciolo? and
Michel Barnier are now Special Advisers; Martine
Reicherts has returned to the Commission as a senior official.
For more details on all departing commissioners
and their new roles, please consult our
spreadsheet. The revolving door between the
Barroso II Commission and the corporate sector
Despite the fact that the Code of Conduct for
Commissioners was reformed in 2011 following the
revolving door scandals involving the departures
of members of the Barroso I Commission, major
loopholes remain in both the rules and the way in
which they are implemented (see annex at the end
of this article). The failing rules allow the
corporate capture of the Barroso II Commission to persist – even beyond office.
Viviane Reding (Luxembourg)
Old roles: Commissioner for Justice, Fundamental
Rights and Citizenship (2010-2014); Information
Society and Media (2004-2010); Education and Culture (1999-2004)
New roles: MEP; Board member of Nyrstar; Board
member of Agfa-Gevaert; Trustee of Bertelsmann Foundation; and others
Viviane Reding left the Commission upon her
election to the European Parliament in the May
2014 elections. Despite being an MEP she retains
her ethical obligations as a former commissioner.
However, she has secured authorisation for a
number of new paid and unpaid roles. Most
notably, she applied for and received
authorisation to join the boards of two
companies, the mining company Nyrstar 1 and
Agfa-Gevaert (analog and digital IT), so long as
she abstained from “lobbying and defending” the
companies' interests to the Commission. The Ad
hoc Ethical Committee was not consulted as these
new roles were not considered to have links to
Reding's former portfolio. This is surprising
considering these are big corporations with multiple EU interests.
Reding was appointed to the board of Agfa Gevaert
in May 2015; Reding has yet to join the board of
Nyrstar. In our view, these roles should not have
been authorised by the Commission. Reding was a
commissioner for 15 years giving her huge
internal knowledge, expertise, political know-how
and contacts, skills that are likely to be of
direct interest to these companies. She will also
have taken collective decisions on many issues
that are likely to be of direct interest to these
companies. Yet as a board member she has a
fiduciary duty to act in the interests of the
company and this could conflict with her ongoing
commitments to the Commission and the wider public interest.
Reding has received further authorisations of new
paid roles, including as a member of the board of
trustees (the Kuratorium) of the Bertelsmann
Foundation, a politically-active think-tank.
While separate organisations, the foundation
controls the majority of shares in Bertelsmann,
the global media corporation, (holding 77.6 per
cent of the shares of the Bertelsmann Group) and
three members of the supervisory board of the
company Bertelsmann also sit on the Foundation's Kuratorium.
Reding's move to the Bertelsmann Foundation was
assessed by the Ad hoc Ethical Committee and was
authorised, so long as Reding avoided any
conflicts of interest incompatible with the Code
of Conduct for Commissioners “in particular when
projects of the Bertelsmann Stiftung involved
requesting and/or obtaining Community
co-financing and that, within the 18 months after
ceasing to hold office, she abstained from
lobbying and defending the Foundation's interests to the Commission”.
Yet the Ad hoc Ethical Committee's assessment
seems rather cursory, amounting only to one
paragraph and apparently not reflecting on the
deeper links between the company and the
foundation, not to mention the wider interests of the corporation.
There is huge potential for the Bertelsmann media
and services company to benefit from the
political knowledge and contacts of Reding,
particularly her know-how in the relevant media,
privacy and education sectors. Furthermore,
Reding was part of the Commission which initiated
the EU-US trade negotiations (TTIP). Bertelsmann
is a global media company likely to benefit from
TTIP and the Foundation has massively promoted
TTIP. This role should not have been authorised
so soon after Reding left the Commission.
We have additional concerns that Reding holds
these paid roles as a sitting MEP, particularly
as she is part of the Parliament's trade
committee and currently acting as rapporteur on a
report to make recommendations on the
negotiations for the very controversial Trade in
Services Agreement or TiSA. The MEP Code of
Conduct should be urgently reformed to prevent
MEPs from holding certain second jobs, including
consultancies, lobby jobs and paid directorships.
We contacted Viviane Reding prior to publishing
this report; no response was received. More
information:
http://corporateeurope.org/revolvingdoorwatch/cases/viviane-reding
or in our spreadsheet.
Karel De Gucht (Belgium)
Old roles: Commissioner for Trade (2010-2014);
Development and Humanitarian Affairs (2009-2010)
New roles: Member of the management boards of
Belgacom (now known as Proximus); Merit Capital
NV; CVC Partners; and other roles
De Gucht is the former EU Commissioner for Trade,
and has been criticised by civil society for the
way he consistently put big business in the
driving seat of EU trade negotiations. He now has
Commission authorisation to join the management
boards of three different companies: telecoms
company Belgacom, and two operating in the financial sector.
The Ad hoc Ethical Committee was not consulted by
the Commission about De Gucht's move to Belgacom;
the Commission decided that the activity was not
related to De Gucht's former Commission
portfolio. And yet, while De Gucht did not
directly regulate telecommunications in his
Commission role, he led on the negotiations for
TTIP which has been of growing interest to the
telecommunications sector. Belgacom (which now
operates as Proximus and also owns digital media
company Skynet) is the biggest telecoms operator
in Belgium and a member of the lobby group
European Telecommunications Network Operators'
Association (ETNO). ETNO and Skynet lobbied EU
trade officials on TTIP in meetings behind closed
doors when De Gucht was Trade Commissioner. The
telecoms/ IT sector was the third biggest
lobbyist on TTIP in the two years to February
2014 (while De Gucht was still at the
Commission), meaning it had the third largest
number of behind-closed-doors meeting with DG
Trade. Proximus is in the EU lobby register and
has already spent €299,999 on lobbying this year (January-July 2015).
In our view, the Commission should not have
authorised this move. It was wrong that the Ad
hoc Ethical Committee was not asked to consider
this case, and the standard 18 month direct lobby
ban would not be sufficient to prevent the risk
of possible conflicts of interest of De Gucht, a
former trade commissioner, joining the board of Belgacom/ Proximus.2
By contrast, the Ad hoc Ethical Committee was
asked to consider De Gucht's move to CVC Capital
Partners, apparently the third biggest private
equity and investment advisory company in the
world. The committee rejects the possibility of a
conflict of interest because De Gucht's former
role only involved legal frameworks for trade and
investment. Again, De Gucht's wider role as an EU
commissioner during the devastating global
financial crisis is not taken into account. Only
the Commission's Legal Service asked for the
standard 18 month lobby ban to be specifically
included in the authorisation decision.
De Gucht states that this role was unremunerated
but further information is redacted. The Ad hoc
Ethical Committee writes: “The Committee notes
that the envisaged activity will be
non-remunerated but that Mr De Gucht may
[redaction]”. The Commission says the redacted
text refers to “contractual private data” but if
it referred to other non-monetary benefits
accruing to De Gucht from this role, the
information should not have been removed. Whether
or not a role is remunerated is a major (although
not the only) factor when considering revolving
door moves. Whatever the case, in our view,
ex-commissioners should not be able to join the
board of financial companies so soon after leaving office.
De Gucht has also received authorisation to join
the board (unpaid) of Merit Capital, an
independent private bank and stockbroker based in
Antwerp but with additional offices in Deurle,
Hasselt, Kortrijk and Leuven, as well as Zürich.
De Gucht's Commission declaration of financial
interests of 28 March 2011 indicates that he was
previously a member of the board of directors of
Merit Capital Group (formerly Sequoia
International) prior to joining the Commission.
During his time at the Commission, he retained a
substantial shareholding; his 2014 declaration
said that he owned an "usufruct" proportion of
744,700 Merit Capital shares, estimated to be worth €1,900,474.
Merit Capital is not in the EU lobby register.
However, Merit is active in Belgisch Financieel
Forum, as well as the Belgian Corporate Finance
Association, and it is a member of Febelfin, the
main Belgian financial lobby group. Febelfin
explicitly states that they are doing EU lobbying
for their members and Febelfin is part of the
European Banking Federation which is very active at the EU level.
We contacted Karel de Gucht prior to publishing
this report; no response was received. More
information:
http://corporateeurope.org/revolvingdoorwatch/cases/karel-de-gucht
or in our spreadsheet.
Neelie Kroes (Netherlands)
Old roles: Commissioner for the Digital agenda
(2010-2014); Competition (2004-2010)
New roles: Special Advisor to Bank of America
Merrill Lynch; Board member of the Open Data Institute; and others
Neelie Kroes has several new roles, including
acting as Special Advisor to the Bank of America
Merrill Lynch (Europe, Middle East, Africa). The
Commission authorised this role, after consulting
the Ad hoc Ethical Committee, but we have several concerns about this.
As the committee notes, Kroes describes the role
in very general terms: the only specific topic
she mentions is “female leadership” and as she
told the Commission, was likely to take the form
of “sharing experiences, insights and exchanging
perspectives”. She added: “More concretely for my
role as an advisor, this means I could be
requested to contribute to conferences and
engaging politicians and thought leaders.” But
engaging “politicians and thought leaders” sounds
very much like it could entail lobbying. Her
email also refers to strengthened “client
engagement”. Kroes should have been asked to
provide further clarification about what any of this might entail.
Kroes was told to avoid direct lobbying on behalf
of BoAML for 18 months, but no mention was made
of its clients or of indirect lobbying. For
another of her roles, as unpaid board member of
the Open Data Institute (a non-profit
organisation which promotes “innovation”), Kroes
was told to ensure that “that no company using
the services of the Open Data Institute could
unduly benefit from the knowledge and expertise
she had gained during her terms of office”. It
seems inconsistent and an omission not to have
insisted upon a far wider lobby ban on Kroes' BoAML role.
Furthermore, Kroes was a European commissioner
during the entire span of the financial crisis;
we question whether it is appropriate for her to
join a major bank with European interests, in any
capacity, so soon after leaving the Commission.
Afterall, BoAML spent over €1,250,000 in 2014 on
EU lobbying (up from only €50,000 in the previous
year, according to the LobbyFacts archive), on a wide range of EU dossiers.
Kroes originally joined the Commission in 2004
amidst claims of possible conflicts of interest
relating to her then 25 corporate roles.
Presenting herself to the Parliament for her
confirmation hearing, she promised at the time
that “she would not to return to the private
sector once her term as Commissioner for Competition had expired”.
We attempted to contact Neelie Kroes via BoAML
prior to publishing this report; no response was
received. More information:
http://corporateeurope.org/revolvingdoorwatch/cases/neelie-kroes
or in our spreadsheet.
Siim Kallas (Estonia)
Old roles: Commissioner for Transport
(2010-2014); Commissioner for Administrative
Affairs, Audit and Anti-Fraud (2004-2010);
Commissioner for Economic and Monetary Affairs (2004-2004)
New roles: Consultant for Nortal (terminated);
Special Adviser to Commissioner Dombrovskis;
Chair of Commission's High Level Group of
Independent Experts on European Structural and Investment Funds; and others
The Commission authorised the appointment of Siim
Kallas as a consultant to Nortal to “participate
in projects promoting good governance practices
in countries outside EU” on the condition that he
refrained from lobbying the Commission and/or its
services, for Nortal, during 18 months after the
end of his mandate. Nortal is perhaps the biggest
IT services company in the Baltic region and its
clients include those from the public and private
sectors in the oil, banking, telecoms, and manufacturing sectors.
This case was not referred to the Ad hoc Ethical
Committee because there was no perceived link
with Kallas' former transport portfolio. However,
when Kallas applied for authorisation for this
role (28 March 2015), he was already acting as
Special Adviser to Commissioner Valdis
Dombrovskis on the issues of “Strategic and
political advice on future of EMU, economic
relations with Eastern neighbourhood”. An adviser
on economic relations with the EU's eastern
neighbourhood could have links/ overlaps with
consultancy aimed at finding Nortal some new
clients in countries outside EU. In our view,
there is a fine line between offering advice to a
commissioner and lobbying; but as far as the
Commission is concerned, the former is allowed
and the latter is apparently not.
As no reference is made to Kallas' additional
role of special adviser (he does not raise it and
the Commission paperwork does not mention it
either) it appears that this element was not
fully explored. This is a serious omission and
shows the limitations of the revolving doors
process as conducted by the Commission (led by
the Secretariat-General, with inputs from the
Legal Service), looking at new roles on a case by
case basis, rather than looking at the overall
portfolio of a former commissioner's new roles.
Special adviser rules and procedures may also
need looking at. The declaration of activities
signed by Special Adviser Kallas released under
access to documents had not been updated to
mention his new work for Nortal. Following a CEO
complaint about this matter, the Commission has
told us that Kallas has now updated his declaration.
We contacted Siim Kallas prior to publishing this
report. In September 2015 he told us that,
“In June I had some speeches in Oman about
Estonian experience of good governance. This was
intended to help IT company Nortal to sell their
IT solutions in this country. These activities
have nothing to do with my role as advisor to Mr.
Dombrovskis. My contract with Nortal was
terminated as from the 6th of August 2015, about
what I informed the European Commission. I have
never lobbied for Nortal in European institutions.”
Notwithstanding Kallas' short tenure with Nortal,
the Commission should not have authorised this role.
More information:
http://corporateeurope.org/revolvingdoorwatch/cases/siim-kallas
or in our spreadsheet.
José Manuel Barroso (Portugal)
Old role: President of the European Commission (2004-2014)
New roles: Member of Steering Group of the
Bilderberg Conferences; Honorary Chairman of the
Honorary Committee of the European Business Summit; and others
José Manuel Barroso has accepted, and been
authorised in, 22 new positions, including ten in
the academic world, plus roles in the arts, for
think tanks and with speakers' bureaux. Many,
although not all of these, are unpaid or honorary positions.
However, a number of his new roles raise
questions as to how they were handled, including
his membership of the steering group of the
Bilderberg Conferences; and his role as Honorary
Chairman of the Honorary Committee of the
European Business Summit. These are unpaid roles
and the Bilderberg role was passed to the Ad hoc
Ethical Committee for an opinion. However, we are
not clear how much consideration there was about
the nature of the Bilderberg conference. In
particular, there appears to have been little
reflection on the fact that as reported by The
Guardian last year: “Bilderberg is packed to the
gills with senior members of powerful lobby
groups” and is “big business. And big politics.
And big lobbying”. It seems a strange omission
not to have reminded Barroso about the ban on
lobbying in the context of his Bilderberg role.
Meanwhile, the Commission did not consider that
it even needed to formally authorise Barroso's
new role at the European Business Summit, due to
its honorary nature, despite the EBS being the
largest business lobby event in the Brussels
bubble calendar. It simply accepted having been
notified of the role. But what does being
Honorary Chairman of the Honorary Committee
actually mean? Is it having your name and photo
on the website, or something more? Does the
committee meet in person? The Commission never
clarified this. By contrast, it did go through a
formal authorisation process for Barroso's new
role as an (unpaid) member of the international
board of the Madrid Opera House!
It is not always possible to understand the
rationale of the Commission in its handling of
these roles: which ones they consider require
active authorisation or not, and which are passed
to the committee for an opinion, or not. For the
sake of clarity and transparency, in our view all
new roles, unpaid and paid, and whether
'honorary' or not, should be authorised.
We contacted José Manuel Barroso via the
University of Princeton prior to publishing this
report; no response was received. More
information:
http://corporateeurope.org/revolvingdoorwatch/cases/jos-manuel-barroso
or in our spreadsheet.
A few other cases of note:
Joaquín Almunia (Spain)
Among the 13 roles for which ex-Competition
Commissioner Joaquín Almunia has received
authorisation is as a paid member of the
'scientific committee' to produce the study
'Building the Energy Union to Fuel European
Growth' by the European House-Ambrosetti. The
latter is a for-profit consultancy based in Italy
and its board includes senior staff from Enel,
ING bank, JP Morgan and others. In fact the
Energy Union study was “requested” by (and is
presumably funded by) Enel, the major Italian
multinational operating in the power and gas
markets. Enel has its logo on the study and
shares the copyright; the advisory board for the
study included several Enel staff including
Francesco Starace, the Chief Executive, and
Simone Mori, Head of European Affairs, plus three
other staffers. Commissioning third parties to
undertake research and policy work in an area
where they wish to boost their strategic
influence is a common way for corporations to promote their agenda.
Almunia's own preface to the report talks about
how to improve competitiveness: “We need to
achieve the single market for electricity and
gas, through interconnections, common regulations
and adequate incentives for investors.” This
implies that we need to build new infrastructure
for fossil fuels which locks us into long-term
use, while “incentives for investors” means
public money to “leverage” ie subsidise dirty
energy / infrastructure companies to help achieve
this. While the report supports the move to
decarbonisation of the EU's energy system by
2050, its policy recommendations appear to be
more in tune with Enel's interests and include a
single market for energy (which would make it
easier for big energy companies to operate across
borders), and a stronger emissions trading scheme.
Enel is a major EU lobbyist spending over
€2,000,000 in 2014. Since December 2014, Enel has
met top officials in the Commission at least
eight times (according to IntegrityWatch),
including a meeting with Vice-President Maroš
Šefcovic who is responsible for the EU's Energy Union.
When the Commission was asked to authorise this
role, the Ad hoc Ethical Committee said the study
may “provide a useful contribution to EU
endeavours”. The Commission approved Almunia's
paid role in this study as long as he did not
“favour the commercial interests of the companies
involved”. But this is rather meaningless
considering that Enel commissioned, and likely
paid for, the study and has its logo all over it.
The Commission should have taken a far more
sceptical view about this role and the automatic
benefits likely to accrue to Enel from having an
ex-commissioner endorsing the study. Almunia did
not respond to CEO's questions.
Maria Damanaki (Greece)
Maria Damanaki the former Commissioner for
Maritime Affairs and Fisheries (2010-14) has been
authorised to accept one new role as Global
Managing Director for Oceans for The Nature
Conservancy (TNC), a US-based NGO. The Nature
Conservancy publicly announced its recruitment of
Damanaki one month before the role was authorised
by the Commission, something which the rules
should clearly forbid. Twice Damanaki was asked
to provide further information about her precise
role at TNC and the nature of its activities in
Europe. Ultimately, she was authorised to accept
the role provided that she “abstained from
lobbying the Commission and its departments on
any issues with a potential link to her former
portfolio... for 18 months after leaving the Commission”.
TNC was one of several NGOs criticised by Naomi
Klein for its links to fossil fuel companies. The
board of directors of TNC is full of people with
corporate roles including at Goldman Sachs,
Google, Alibaba group, Blackstone Group, and many
others. TNC's Vice Chair is James E Rogers, the
retired Chairman, President and CEO of Duke
Energy; the head of TNC, Mark Tercek, is a former
Managing Director and Partner at Goldman Sachs, where he worked for 24 years.
In our view, the Commission should have applied a
far lengthier and broader lobby ban, with
specific reference to those corporations with
funding or governance links to the TNC. Even if
Damanaki does not directly lobby the Commission
for 18 months, she is clearly a high-profile and
well-connected individual and she would be able
to provide substantial advocacy advice (indirect
lobbying) to her new employer. It should also
have seriously considered whether it was even
appropriate for Damanaki to take such a role
which is so closely associated with her previous
portfolio, at an organisation so close to
corporate interests, soon after leaving office.
We contacted Maria Damanaki; she told us that
there were no overlaps between her old role and
the new one and that there was no basis for
concerns about conflicts of interest; her full response can be read here.
More information:
http://corporateeurope.org/revolvingdoorwatch/cases/maria-damanaki
or in our spreadsheet.
Janez Potocnik (Slovenia)
Among the new moves of former Environment
Commissioner Janez Potocnik is Chairman of the
Forum for the Future of Agriculture, which is the
creation of the European Landowners' Organisation
and Syngenta. Syngenta is one of the world's
largest pesticide companies; in the EU lobby
register it declares a 2014 lobby budget of
€1,250,000-€1,499,999. In 2011, CEO wrote of the
fourth Forum for the Future of Agriculture: “What
was announced as a 'meeting place for those who
have a stake in the future of agriculture' was in
fact a tightly orchestrated lobbying event for
Syngenta to polish its image and promote its
agenda for the reform of EU agricultural
policies.” The Commission authorised this move so
long as Potocnik's involvement excludes anything
that could be related to the commercial interests
of Syngenta. It is hard to understand what this
means in practice, considering that the Forum for
the Future of Agriculture is a lobby event
promoting the interests of agribusiness
corporations representing their own agricultural
model. When asked by CEO, Potocnik told us that:
"I was as Commissioner for Environment
participating quite regularly on FFA since I have
believed, and I still do so, that this is one of
the best opportunities to prepare agricultural
community to necessary changes arising from the
need to respect sustainability."
More information:
http://corporateeurope.org/revolvingdoorwatch/cases/janez-poto-nik
or in our spreadsheet.
Algirdas Šemeta (Lithuania)
Algirdas Šemeta, the former commissioner for
taxation and customs union is now the new
Ukrainian Business Ombudsman. This role forms
part of Ukraine's anti-corruption initiative and
involves the Ukrainian Government and business
associations including the American Chamber of
Commerce in Ukraine, the European Business
Association, the Federation of Ukrainian
Employers, the Ukrainian Chamber of Commerce and
Industry, and the Ukrainian League of
Industrialists and Entrepreneurs. The
Commission's Ad hoc Ethical Committee decided
that the position of Ukraine Business Ombudsman
was “essentially one of independent service in
the public interest”, but we were very surprised
that Šemeta was not even reminded of the standard
18 month lobby ban, considering its links with
business interests. We tried to contact Šemeta
via twitter and facebook but no response was received.
More information:
http://corporateeurope.org/revolvingdoorwatch/cases/algirdas-emeta
or in our spreadsheet.
Štefan Füle (Czech Republic)
Štefan Füle is the former Commissioner for
Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy
2010-2014 and is now a member of the think-tank,
the Central European Strategy Council’s
International Advisory Board; according to
information from the Commission (as of 7 August
2015) he has not sought authorisation for this
role. The CESC aims to “strengthen the voice of
Slovakia and Central Europe in European and
global affairs” by connecting “key Central
European personalities and experts in foreign and
security policy”. The Code of Conduct for
Commissioners says that serving commissioners can
hold “honorary unpaid posts in political,
cultural, artistic or charitable foundations or
educational institutions”; presumably these roles
for former commissioners do not require
notification or authorisation. And yet, many
other former commissioners have notified such
unpaid roles, and some have been through a formal
authorisation process too. Arguably there is a
link between this role and Füle's former role as
Commissioner for Enlargement and European
Neighbourhood Policy. We think all such roles
should go through a formal authorisation process.
We tried to contact Füle via the Central European
Strategy Council but we received no reply.
Conclusions
In September 2014, a research report written for
the European Parliament concluded that:
“Overall, the [Commissioners' Code of Conduct] is
characterised by its poor checks and balances,
the absence of a coherent implementation system,
and opacity surrounding its operation (eg with
regard to the Ad hoc Ethical Committee). Whilst
other ethics systems contribute to enhance public
trust in government, the EC’s system appears
tilted towards the Commissioners’ political and career interests”.
We couldn't agree more and it is time for an
overhaul of the ethical rules for commissioners,
including for after they leave office, as
suggested below (and further detailed in the
annex):All former commissioners should be
explicitly forbidden from accepting any new role
which risks creating a conflict of interest with
their former role as a European commissioner for
three years after their departure; this would at
least match the period of the generous
transitional allowance to which all
ex-commissioners are entitled. If this had been
in place, in our view, at least eight authorised
roles by Barroso II commissioners would have been rejected:
Viviane Reding to sit on the boards of the mining
company Nyrstar, Agfa Gevaert and the Bertelsmann Foundation
Siim Kallas to provide consultancy to IT company Nortal
Neelie Kroes to advise Bank of America Merrill Lynch
Karel De Gucht to sit on the boards of CVC, Merit
Capital and Belgacom/ Proximus
A number of other authorisations are problematic,
revealing a cavalier attitude to the risk that
corporate interests could gain significant
benefit from the recruitment of former
commissioners to a variety of paid and unpaid roles:
José Manuel Barroso: European Business Summit and Bilderberg Conference
Maria Damanaki: The Nature Conservancy
Joaquín Almunia: energy study conducted by The
European House-Ambrosetti, commissioned by Enel
Janez Potocnik: Forum for the Future of Agriculture
Algirdas Šemeta: Ukrainian Business Ombudsman
The ban on lobbying should be extended to a full
three years and it should explicitly cover both
direct and indirect lobbying. If there is any
likelihood that a new role could involve
lobbying, the role should be rejected altogether,
rather than restrictions being placed on the lobbying component.
It is too limited to restrict the lobby ban to
issues related to former commissioners' most
recent portfolio. Because commissioners are
high-profile and influential individuals who, as
part of the College of Commissioners, take many
collective decisions on a wide range of issues
over a period of years, the lobby ban should be
absolute and cover all issues. It should also be
expanded to cover the lobbying of all EU institutions, not just the Commission.
All new roles (paid or unpaid, 'honorary' or not,
public office or not) should be formally notified
to the Commission, and should go through an authorisation process.
There should be full transparency about all
former commissioners' revolving door moves, via a
dedicated website which publishes information
along the lines of that in our spreadsheet. Moves
which have been notified to the Commission but
which do not need formal authorisation under the
current rules (ie public office) should also be
included. Cases where new roles were considered
and ultimately rejected for authorisation should also be made transparent.
The current Ad hoc Ethical Committee should be
abolished and replaced with a fully independent
ethics committee made up of experts drawn from
member states' ethics and administration systems,
with no links to the EU institutions, which would
be responsible for the whole authorisation
process. This would stop reliance on former
EU-nsiders and avoid the current situation where
Commission colleagues and officials are required
to judge their (recent, former) colleagues and/
or to make decisions which could limit their own
post-departure career options. The fully
independent committee should be supported by a
well-resourced secretariat with investigative
powers. This would enable further research and
checking to take place and could also help with
post-authorisation monitoring (see below).
The new independent ethics committee should be
responsible for looking at all former
commissioners' new roles – paid and unpaid – and
its work and findings should be fully
transparent. Its remit could be further expanded
to all matters concerning ethics and conflict of
interest regulations, policies, codes applying to
Commission staff and commissioners, and their
implementation and enforcement, with the aim of
promoting high ethical standards and best
practice. This would help introduce joined-up
thinking in cases like that of Siim Kallas who
has multiple roles and obligations, as a former
commissioner, a current Commission special
adviser, and (until August 2015) a private sector consultant.
It is highly problematic that former
commissioners' entitlement to the transitional
allowance (three years) exceeds their formal
obligation to seek authorisation for new roles
(eighteen months), and that it is possible to
earn both a new salary and the allowance
simultaneously. The requirement to notify should
match the period of entitlement for the transitional allowance.
It is very presumptuous to pre-announce the
recruitment of a former commissioner before the
Commission has given its formal authorisation. No
new roles should be publicised until they have received full authorisation.
Finally, we note that there are no revolving
doors rules which apply to the President of the
European Council. We propose that the European
Council also adopts these recommendations
urgently, considering the senior nature of that role.
Overall, there needs to be a far more rigorous
and, dare we say, sceptical, approach taken to
the revolving door, especially as it affects the
EU's most senior leaders, so as to ensure that
experiences and insights gained from years of
working at the highest levels of public office do
not end up benefiting private, corporate interests.
The case for reform is compelling, although it is
likely too late to impact upon the former Barroso
II commissioners. So the question is whether
Jean-Claude Juncker's College of Commissioners
are prepared to vote to toughen up the rules for
when they themselves eventually leave office. We are not holding our breath.
Annex: Existing rules and proposals for change
In this annex, we present the existing rules and
present an in-depth analysis of how they should be changed.
1. What are the revolving door obligations on former commissioners?
According to the Code of Conduct for Commissioners the rules are as follows:
For 18 months after leaving office, a
commissioner intending to engage in an
“occupation”, shall inform the Commission.
The College of Commissioners ultimately decides
whether or not to authorise a role (and whether
to place any limits or restrictions on it) based
on its compatibility with EU treaty article 245
which gives former commissioners a duty “to
behave with integrity and discretion as regards
the acceptance, after they have ceased to hold
office, of certain appointments or benefits”.
When the occupation is related to the
commissioner's former portfolio, the Commission
is obliged to seek advice of the Ad hoc Ethical
Committee. When cases are not referred to the
committee, the Commission's Secretariat General
develops a proposal for authorisation, upon which
the Legal Service is consulted.
The rules ban all former commissioners for 18
months after leaving office, from lobbying the
Commission on behalf of business, clients,
employers on matters connected to their previous portfolio.
The rules say that public office roles need to be
notified to the Commission, but do not need formal authorisation.
The rules make clear that commissioners have an
ongoing duty, beyond the 18 months after they
have left office, to behave with integrity and discretion.
Former commissioners are also entitled to a
generous transitional allowance for three years,
of between 40 per cent and 65 per cent of the
final basic salary, depending on the length of
service. The allowance is capped; if a former
commissioner takes up any new gainful activity,
the new pay added together with the allowance,
cannot exceed their former remuneration as a
member of the Commission. Since July 2012, the
basic gross salary of a commissioner is €20,832
per month; the President earns €25,554. The net
average salary across the EU is €1470 per month.
2. Composition and Tasks of the Ad hoc Ethical Committee
The Ad hoc Ethical Committee consists of a trio
of ex-EU institution insiders (currently a former
Commission director-general, an ex-MEP, and an
ex-EU judge), tasked with providing an opinion to
the Commission on the compatibility of former
commissioners' proposed new roles with their
obligations under the EU treaty. The remit of the
Ad hoc Ethical Committee is limited. It can only
consider the cases that are referred to it by the
Commission, and the Commission only hands over
cases where a proposed new role is considered to
have a link with the commissioner's former
portfolio or another specific concern. The
committee can only give an opinion or make a
recommendation; it is not a decision-making body.
The committee was embroiled in a major scandal in
2012-13 when the then Commission President
Barroso decided to re-appoint Michel Petite as
the committee's Chairman. Petite had had a
controversial spin through the revolving door
himself from the Commission's Legal Service to
global law firm Clifford Chance in 2008 where his
clients have included tobacco firm Philip Morris.
Petite has also carried out lobbying vis a vis
the Commission. Following an NGO complaint, the
European Ombudsman wrote to Barroso recommending
that Petite be replaced; soon after he 'resigned'
and was replaced. The Commission has yet to admit
any wrong-doing in this debacle.
3. Detailed analysis of necessary changes to the
Code of Conduct for Commissioners
3.1 Conflicts of interest and lobbying
The current Code of Conduct for Commissioners is
far too vague to provide an adequate framework
for the assessment of whether former
commissioners' proposed new roles are
appropriate. Article 245 of the Treaty on the
Functioning of the European Union (TFEU) which
gives former commissioners a duty “to behave with
integrity and discretion as regards the
acceptance, after they have ceased to hold
office, of certain appointments or benefits” is
very subjective and unclear. Moreover the phrase
“conflict of interest” does not appear within the revolving door rules at all.
Considering this, it is perhaps not surprising
that all proposed Barroso II Commission roles put
before it, have been authorised by the College of
Commissioners (Commission information to 1
October 2015). Additionally, in no case has the
Commission implemented tougher restrictions than
those set out in the Code of Conduct. In our
view, all former commissioners should be
explicitly forbidden from accepting any new role
which risks creating a situation of a conflict of
interest with their former role as a European
commissioner for three years after their
departure. This should be accompanied by a
comprehensive explanation of what this means
(perhaps with reference to the OECD's guidelines in this area).
There are further flaws within the Code of
Conduct for Commissioners, compounded by the lack
of definition of key words and phrases. The word
“occupation” is unclear: does that mean only paid
work, or unpaid roles too? Lobbying is also not
explicitly defined, but it appears to be limited
to direct lobbying: sending emails and letters to
the Commission; or making calls and holding
meetings with former colleagues. Indirect
lobbying ie providing advice to new colleagues on
the best way to approach the Commission, based on
the insights and network gained as a former
commissioner, does not seem to be included and
this represents a major loophole in the rules.
The lobby ban for former commissioners needs to
be toughened up. The ban on lobbying should be
extended to a full three years and it should
explicitly cover both direct and indirect
lobbying. If there is any likelihood that a new
role could involve lobbying, the role should be
rejected altogether, rather than restrictions
being placed on the lobbying component.
As outlined above, in the cases of De Gucht,
Kroes, Reding and others, we feel it is too
limited to restrict the lobby ban to issues
related to former commissioners' most recent
portfolio. Commissioners are high-profile and
influential individuals who, as part of the
college, take many collective decisions on a
wider range of issues over a period of years. In
this case, the lobby ban should be absolute and
cover all issues. It should also be expanded to
cover the lobbying of all EU institutions, not just the Commission.
3.2 Notification and / or authorisation
The current Code of Conduct is too limited in
determining which roles require authorisation,
which require only to be notified to the
Commission, and when the Ad hoc Ethical Committee
should be asked to provide an opinion, and it has
led to some strange decisions.
The Code of Conduct says that serving
commissioners can hold “honorary unpaid posts in
political, cultural, artistic or charitable
foundations or educational institutions”.
Honorary is interpreted as no management role, no
decision-making power, and no responsibility or
control of operations. The revolving door section
of the rules does not explicitly refer to such
roles, so presumably these role fall outside of
the rules and do not requite notification or
authorisation. A range of roles have been classed
in this category and accepted as notified but not
requiring authorisation. But in some cases, we
have questioned that decision. Surely when former
Commission President Barroso accepts a role with
Brussels' biggest corporate lobbying event, the
European Business Summit, it should go through a formal authorisation process?
Also, Štefan Füle is now a member of the Central
European Strategy Council’s International
Advisory Board and, as of 7 August 2015, he has
not been in touch with the Commission about this
role. The Code of Conduct for Commissioners says
that serving commissioners can hold “honorary
unpaid posts in political, cultural, artistic or
charitable foundations or educational
institutions”. Honorary is interpreted as no
management role, no decision-making power, and no
responsibility or control of operations. The
revolving door section of the rules does not
explicitly refer to such roles, so presumably
these roles do not require notification or
authorisation. And yet, many other former
commissioners have notified such unpaid roles,
and some have been through a formal authorisation
process. Arguably there is a link between this
role and Füle's role as Commissioner for
Enlargement and European Neighbourhood Policy.
We consider it would be far better to avoid any
confusion by ensuring that all new roles (paid or
unpaid, 'honorary' or not, public office or not)
should be formally notified to the Commission,
and should go through an authorisation process.
3.3 Transparency
Currently, the only way to get the concrete
details of former commissioners' new moves
involves scrutiny of Commission minutes to find
such decisions, followed by access to documents
requests to obtain the paperwork. This is
inefficient for both the Commission (who have
privately expressed their frustration to us about
the volume of our access to documents requests on
these issues) and for those of us who wish to
scrutinise the new roles. It is also not
effective transparency. The European Ombudsman
has recently suggested that there should be full
transparency about all former commissioners'
revolving door moves, via a dedicated website
which publishes information along the lines of
that in our spreadsheet. We echo that demand, and
if the information is already releasable under
access to documents, the information should be
pro-actively published by the Commission so it
can be easily accessed by citizens and watchdog
groups. Moves which have been notified to the
Commission but which do not need formal
authorisation under the current rules (ie public
office) should also be included. Cases where new
roles were considered and ultimately rejected for
authorisation should also be made transparent.
The Commission has so far refused to provide any
further information on three requests for
authorisation that were subsequently withdrawn by
the former commissioners concerned: Connie
Hedegaard (one role) and Androulla Vassiliou (two
roles). Vassiliou has told us that “the Ad Hoc
Ethical Committee's opinion was that there might
have been a conflict of interest, I respected
their opinion and I rejected the two offers
without proceeding with an application to the
Europ. Commission. As I rejected the two offers,
the matter is considered closed.”
A similar process led to Barroso I commissioner
Charlie McCreevy eventually withdrawing an
application to join the board of a bank in
2009-10 having seen the (negative) recommendation
of the Ad hoc Ethical Committee, and after an
email exchange with the then Secretary General,
but before the College was requested to make a
final decision. We consider that all opinions of
the Ad hoc Ethical Committee should be made
transparent in all cases considered.
3.4 Independence of the committee
According to our database, only 35 out of 96
authorised cases have been referred to the Ad hoc
Ethical Committee. No formal capacity and
resources are allocated to the committee to help
it to do its work, although the Commission has
told us that the committee can “request the
Commission to provide the additional information
that they consider necessary”. If a request for
authorisation has not been passed to the
committee, the Commission's own services (the
ethics unit within the Secretariat General)
produce a recommendation for the ultimate
decision-maker, the College of Commissioners. As
far as we are aware, the college has yet to
dissent from any recommendation provided to it on
a Barroso II revolving door move.3 The college's
meeting minutes do not reveal the extent of
discussion and debate when the college takes a
decision on one of these cases, but it is not
hard to imagine that it plays a 'rubber stamp'
role, simply endorsing what is recommended to it.
It is therefore very important that the advice
provided is of the highest quality. This is why
we think that the present system should be overhauled.
The current Ad hoc Ethical Committee should be
abolished and replaced with a fully independent
ethics committee made up of experts drawn from
member states' ethics and administration systems
with no links to the EU institutions. This
independence is important. In our view, the EU
institutions are not as vigilant as they should
be about the risk of conflicts of interest
arising from the revolving door. Current
commissioners, staff and ex-EU insiders should
not formulate advice or make decisions on their
contemporaries' proposed new roles; there is a
risk that residual loyalties might skew the
process. Additionally, it is not appropriate to
ask those who might wish to spin through the
revolving door in the future, to advise or make
decisions on others' revolving door moves today.
Arguably the current Code of Conduct rules placed
President Barroso in a situation of a conflict of
interest when he handled the revolving door roles
of his former colleagues. On 9 September 2014,
former commissioner Viviane Reding wrote to
Barroso to seek authorisation to join the
Bertelsmann Foundation. Meanwhile, on 9 October
2014 while still president, Barroso himself wrote
to Catherine Day, the Secretary General to
request authorisation for his own plans for
post-office activities, including at the World
Economic Forum. A fully independent committee
would (help) resolve this problem.
The fully independent committee should be
supported by a well-resourced secretariat with
investigative powers. This would enable further
research and checking to take place, ensuring
that former commissioners' assertions are not the
only evidence used when formulating a
recommendation. It could also help with
post-authorisation monitoring (see below).
The new independent ethics committee should be
responsible for all former commissioners' new
roles – paid and unpaid – and its work and
recommendations should be fully transparent. It
should be proactive, rather than waiting for
issues to be referred to it. Its remit could be
further expanded to all matters concerning ethics
and conflict of interest regulations, policies,
codes applying to Commission staff and
commissioners, and their implementation and
enforcement, with the aim of promoting high
ethical standards and best practice. This would
help introduce joined-up thinking in cases like
that of Siim Kallas who has had multiple and
simultaneous roles and obligations, as a former
commissioner, a current Commission special
adviser, and a (former) private sector
consultant. The independent ethics committee,
supported by a resourced secretariat, should also
be responsible for monitoring that the rules and
any specific conditions placed upon new roles, are abided by.
3.5 Consistent application of the rules
The way in which former commissioners are
informed about the authorisations of their new
roles and their ongoing obligations varies
significantly. Sometimes, former commissioners
have been reminded about their obligations under
Article 245 of the EU treaty “to behave with
integrity and discretion” and to follow the
“obligation of professional secrecy”. Article 245
applies equally to all commissioners; so why not remind them of that equally?
And the lobby ban is handled differently from
case to case. It seems a major omission not to
have even mentioned the standard lobby ban in the
case of former commissioner Algirdas Šemeta in
his role as Ukrainian business ombudsman, a role
set up and paid for by business interests in
Ukraine. In fact this role was authorised without
any reminder at all, let alone any added restrictions.
In our view, a fully independent ethics committee
and secretariat which is responsible for the
whole authorisation process of former
commissioners' new roles, combined with proactive
transparency in this area, could really help to
improve the consistency with which these cases are handled.
3.6 Transitional allowance and authorisation period for new roles
In theory, the transitional allowance ensures
that former commissioners do not need to rush to
find a new job for financial reasons after
leaving the Commission, and thus risk a possible
conflict of interest. By all calculations, the
transitional allowance for former commissioners
is very generous, and if former commissioners are
to have such an entitlement for three years, it
is right that they have ethical obligations for
the same length of time. However, it is highly
problematic that former commissioners'
entitlement to the allowance (three years)
exceeds their formal obligation to seek
authorisation for new roles (eighteen months),
and that it is possible to earn both a new salary
and the allowance simultaneously. Former
commissioners already have a three-year
obligation to notify the Commission about their
other sources of income so that any necessary
reduction can be made to the transitional
allowance due. It would be a very easy change to
extend the period during which commissioners
should seek authorisation for new roles from eighteen months to three years.
However, it should also be the case that the Code
of Conduct for Commissioners applies to all
commissioners whether or not they accept the
transitional allowance. A former commissioner who
rejects the transitional allowance, or who draws
their Commission pension rather than the
allowance, or chooses to earn such a large sum
from a third party that she loses her entitlement
to the allowance, should still be covered by the
revolving door rules in the Code of Conduct.
1 Reding has received Commission authorisation to
join the board of Nyrstar, but has yet to do so.
2To date, De Gucht has not been appointed to the
board of Proximus although newspaper reports in
September 2015 indicated that the move had now
been approved by the Belgian Government (Proximus
is 53 per cent owned by the Belgian state); it
now requires authorisation by the Proximus board.
3 For the Barroso I Commission authorisations in
2009-2010, on one occasion the College of
Commissioners dissented from the opinion of the
Ad hoc Ethical Committee when it voted to
authorise a consultancy business already set up
by former commissioner Günter Verheugen; the
committee had not approved that role.
This report is jointly published with LobbyControl
Revolving doors
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Die Pride and Envie; Flesh, take the poor's advice.
Covetousnesse be gon: Come, Truth and Love arise.
Patience take the Crown; throw Anger out of dores:
Cast out Hypocrisie and Lust, which follows whores:
Then England sit in rest; Thy sorrows will have end;
Thy Sons will live in peace, and each will be a friend.
http://tinyurl.com/6ct7zh6
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Please consider seriously the reason why these elite institutions are not discussed in the mainstream press despite the immense financial and political power they wield?
There are sick and evil occultists running the Western World. They are power mad lunatics like something from a kids cartoon with their fingers on the nuclear button! Armageddon is closer than you thought. Only God can save our souls from their clutches, at least that's my considered opinion - Tony
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