Did you know that every day in Brussels up to 30,000 lobbyists try to influence 750 parliamentarians, 28 commissioners and their staff? Corporations and banks spend millions influencing our European politicians, including on the EU-US trade deal (TTIP), tax regulation, and energy policy. This is a threat to our democracy.
When Barroso, the ex-president of the Commission, the EU’s most powerful institution, recently became chairman of the bank Goldman Sachs, we had simply had enough of unethical behaviour and the corporate capture of the EU. Europe is in its deepest crisis; what the EU needs now, more than ever, is democracy, accountable politicians, and strict controls on lobbying.
MEPs in the European Parliament have drafted a report on “Transparency, integrity and accountability in the EU institutions”, including many proposals to promote cleaner decision-making in Brussels. Hundreds of citizens contributed their ideas to this report. But not all members of the European Parliament (MEPs) agree that there needs to be a change to business as usual.
Please write to MEPS and convince them to vote in favour of tougher transparency and ethics in the EU. MEPs are expected to vote on 12 September; before then, we must demand they stand up for transparency and democracy.
Every email will show MEPs that we are watching them. If together we send thousands of emails, they cannot ignore our demands. We want to forbid MEPs from having side jobs that could involve lobbying the EU institutions, and we want a stronger and more independent ethics committee to investigate potential wrong-doing; we also want to know who is lobbying on which laws, via so-called ‘legislative footprints’.
Tell MEPs to take action to control the influence of big business over EU politics.
We have proven that together we can be successful: thanks to your previous campaigning, many of our proposals have already been taken up in the Parliament’s draft report. Now we need to make sure that this report is not diluted by MEPs who oppose it. Write to the EU parliamentarians before 12 September.
Sophie (Democracy International), Myriam (ALTER-EU) and Daniel (Transparency International EU)