Kallas’s brave intent for transparency

By Tim King

Date: 12/05/05

When the European Commission launches its transparency initiative next week it will be taking a softly, softly approach.

What may yet turn into a brave new world of openness in EU decision-making begins with an orientation debate in the Commission on Wednesday, when Vice-President Siim Kallas and Commission President José Manuel Barroso will set out their ideas. The next step will be a Green Paper followed by discussions with stakeholders. A Commission communication with legislative proposals would follow towards the end of the year.

The bashful beginning belies a brave intent. Siim Kallas wants to achieve significant improvements to the transparency of EU institutions. His ambition runs wider than merely the Commission. The scope of his plans would take in the European Parliament and the national governments - and have significant ramifications for lobbyists both in Brussels and elsewhere. The various strands of the transparency initiative are being bundled together, in the hope that a balance of interests will propel the package forwards.

Perhaps the element most likely to make waves a long way from Brussels is the suggestion that details of who benefits from EU funds should be published: specifically from structural funds and agricultural funds. Up to now, only Estonia and Denmark have routinely published information about who receives what from the Common Agricultural Policy, with the UK joining them earlier this year when the Freedom of Information Act took effect. Some other countries have access to information rules which make it possible to retrieve some of this information, even if it is not routinely published.

At this stage, the Commission will simply be urging other member states to follow suit, without any threat or obligation. But heavier pressure might follow: the transparency purists might demand that receipt of EU funds be made conditional on publication of the details.

What the Commission will not want to do is take responsibility itself for publishing lists of 'end beneficiaries' and their EU income. That would run counter to its efforts to get national administrations to take greater responsibility for ensuring that EU money is properly spent.

The justification for the end beneficiaries move will be couched in terms of a presumption of transparency. What is there to hide? But one of the side effects, which Kallas has already set out in speeches, is that transparency should improve the quality of governance. He is, after all, the commissioner for audit and anti-fraud. Combating the misuse of EU money should be easier if it is more widely known how and where the money is disbursed.

The controversy that flared up last month over Barroso sharing a holiday with Spiros Latsis, the Greek shipping magnate, and hospitality that Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson received from a Microsoft shareholder, has given an added piquancy to elements in the transparency initiative aimed at strengthening personal integrity and institutional independence.

The holiday saga revived interest in the commissioners' code of conduct. Should the code be tightened further? The experience of the UK, which has spent the last ten years revising its codes for ministers, members of parliament, civil servants and special advisers, suggests that codes of conduct can always be improved to take account of the most recent scandal. But the real lesson to be taken from the UK experience is about enforcement.

The codes are policed by the committee on standards in public life and the parliamentary ombudsman. The EU institutions will need reference authorities and adjudicators, to whom ethical questions can be put. Kallas and Barroso want to revive a proposal which has lain dormant since 2000 for an advisory body to enforce a code. But crucially, they want codes of conduct and their enforcement to be extended to the other EU institutions, particularly the Parliament. Unless MEPs are prepared to live by the standards that they seek to impose on commissioners, they will be subject to an accusation of hypocrisy.

For the moment, the Commission seems content to urge lobbyists to improve their own self-regulation. It will not rush to legislation. But that may depend on events: if lobbyists bring the EU institutions into disrepute, then the move to regulation might follow. Conversely, only when the EU institutions have improved their accountability will they be in a position to lecture non-governmental organisations.

How soon will dawn break on this new age of transparency? It may well be that there has been a change of mood. Commissioners, MEPs and others might be ready to grasp that they are not respected mediators of the EU message and that citizens should be allowed themselves to retrieve the information that they want. But the practical obstacles to transparency are still formidable. Even if it wanted to, does the Commission have the resources to make the information available?

Article reports on the European Commission's new initiative to promote openness and transparency in the European Union. Initial discussions were scheduled for the European Commission meeting on 19 May 2005.