Expert groups

A coalition of civil society groups working on lobbying transparency and ethics regulations have called on European Commission Vice President, Frans Timmermans, to wait until the European Parliament and the public have had a chance to comment before introducing new rules on advisory groups, formally known as Expert Groups

Following the publication of the Carte Blance for Fracking report earlier this year, CEO and Friends of the Earth Europe have submitted a complaint to the European Ombudsman about the industry dominated advisory group convened by the Commission to get fracking introduced through the back door.

Has the issue of tax avoidance ever been as important as in the current era of (Commission-backed) austerity? Public budgets continue to be slashed for want of public money, yet the news is filled with corporations avoiding taxes at the same time as their profits are at a record high. So it should be of serious concern to Europe's 500 million citizens that the European Commission has invited to its new advisory group on taxation the very same organisations involved in avoiding it, as well as their tax advisors.

The European Commission has finally responded to the Ombudsman investigation into its advisory groups, but the answer is a serious anti-climax and puts a big question mark over Vice-President for Transparency Frans Timmermans' commitment to tackling excessive industry influence within these groups.

On the same day the Swissleaks tax dodging scandal breaks across Europe, a tax expert from the very same bank involved, HSBC, takes a seat in the European Commission. Not there to answer questions on his employers' outrageous and highly-illegal tax avoidance practices, rather John Everett has been invited to give the Commission advice on tackling tax dodging as a member of a newly-formed advisory group.

The European Commission is publicly talking up its climate ambition on the road to the UN climate talks in Paris this December. But a new briefing by Corporate Europe Observatory and Friends of the Earth Europe shows that in reality, its recently-established advisory group for the evaluation of shale gas development is opening the back door to fracking across Europe, despite massive public opposition.

The European Parliament has overwhelmingly voted in favour of freezing the budgets of the Commission's problematic advisory groups, formally known as Expert Groups. Surprisingly, this is the second time in four years that the Parliament has taken such a drastic step, after the Commission failed to tackle corporate domination within these influential groups (see graph below).

CEO submission to the European Ombudsman Consultation on the composition of Commission expert groups