Wopke Hoekstra

Current Climate Commissioner, made the revolving door alarm sound when he was nominated, as he formerly worked at Shell and McKinsey (Politico). 

Hoekstra was also previously Dutch finance minister, gaining the nickname “Mr. No” due to his habit of not listening to colleagues’ calls for new funds. He “delivered well-shaped budgets and channelled the Dutch national surplus into investments” according to Politico – while “on the European stage, his support for budgetary rigor ― a country that does not respect the bloc’s spending rules should not receive EU funds, he said once ― earned him a mixed reputation, especially when he went out on a limb to reject pooled sharing of EU debt for tackling the pandemic crisis. Later, he said, he regretted that.” (Politico)

Hoekstra was a target of a parliamentary inquiry, after he pushed for further oil and gas exploitation in the north of the Netherlands and rebuffed compensation to devastated households in the region. In his time as Minister of Finance, he provided over €3.4bn in support to aviation company KLM and actively weakened Dutch government objectives to reduce emissions of nitrogen — a potent greenhouse gas. Whilst on the Committee to Combat Tax Evasion, he himself was investigated after the Pandora Papers exposed his shares in an offshore business, Candace Management, in the Virgin Islands.

As a Dutch senator, he simultaneously worked for McKinsey, raising conflict of interest concerns given the consultancy’s controversial clients list includes big pharma, tobacco, and fossil fuel interests. Moreover, his relationship with southern European politicians is already tense. He has been accused of a lack of European solidarity as he raised opposition to COVID-19 financial support whilst pushing further austerity measures.

Party positions/ National government record

The Dutch commissioner, Wopke Hoekstra, entered the European Commission in October as a replacement for climate czar Frans Timmermans and is coming back for another five years, even though his party is not in the Dutch government.” (Politico)

“Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof opted for the safe route and decided to reappoint his current Commissioner Wopke Hoekstra. “This gives the Netherlands a strong candidate for a substantial portfolio,” Schoof said in a post on X. Hoekstra’s Christian Democrat Party is no longer in government, but no other party put forward a candidate.” (Euronews).