Salary study puts transparency to the test

Date: 07/10/1999

By Rory Watson

EU GOVERNMENTS are coming under pressure to reveal what salaries and perks their national civil servants receive when they are seconded to work in their permanent representations in Brussels.

The move comes as the European Commission seeks to establish a reliable guide to EU, national and international salaries. The study is due to be completed early next year, just before the Commission presents its proposals for reforming its own administration and conditions of employment. It will also coincide with an intense debate over the new salary structure for EU officials which must be put in place from the middle of 2001.

Several governments are certain to use the opportunity to press for a cut in Eurocrats' salaries and allowances, but the Commission will argue they are not as generous as is made out. It believes that the findings of the study into diplomats' pay will provide it with the ammunition it needs to fight its corner successfully.

"Our salaries and conditions are totally transparent. But the permanent representations do not want the various EU institutions to know what their terms are and, more importantly, they do not want other governments to know either," claimed one senior Commission official.

Attempts to turn the spotlight of transparency on national diplomats have always failed in the past, but they may be more successful this time.

The exercise has been entrusted to a management consultancy in Denmark, a country which traditionally is one of the Commission's strongest critics and so is unlikely to be accused of bending over to please the EU institution. It will also take a more sophisticated approach than earlier initiatives by including job-evaluation forms for officials to complete.

In addition to the five permanent representations in Brussels which have been asked to participate - those of Germany, Denmark, France, Italy and the UK - the research will include NATO, the United Nations and the European Investment Bank. The exercise will also cover the private sector for the first time, with five European multinational firms taking part. The latter have agreed to cooperate provided their anonymity is guaranteed and it is understood that the various international organisations have signalled their willingness to participate.

Despite their initial reluctance, it now looks as if the EU governments concerned will also cooperate. But before they do so, they are insisting that the Commission abandon its plan to concentrate solely on national diplomats posted to Brussels.

"There has been a discussion of this and the majority of member states took the view that the Commission's approach was slanted since it only looked at officials posted abroad," said one national diplomat. "Some said a more appropriate reference point would be the average of a civil servant's pay over a lifetime's service spent between domestic and foreign assignments."

A compromise formula is now on the cards under which the study would cover the pay and conditions of national civil servants when they are both at home and in Brussels.

EU Governments are coming under pressure to reveal what salaries and perks their national civil servants receive when they are seconded to work in their permanent representations in Brussels. The move comes as the European Commission seeks to establish a reliable guide to EU, national and international salaries. The study is due to be completed early in 2000, just before the Commission presents its proposals for reforming its own administration and conditions of employment. It will also coincide with an intense debate over the new salary structure for EU officials which must be put in place from the middle of 2001.