How to crash a party congress

HOWDY. We were a little grumpy writing parts of this week’s edition of EU Influence. Normally we actually kind of enjoy scrolling through LinkedIn, looking for happy job updates. But this past week’s feed was so filled with lame, clichéd, unconvincing Women’s Day tributes that we got fed up and joined the Kate Middleton conspiracy bandwagon over on X. 

SPONSORED CONGRESS

LOBBYING AT THE PARTY CONGRESSES: Top pols, party bosses, boring speeches and booze — what could be a more enticing environment for lobbyists than the party congresses? You don’t have to be a delegate to get in the door — but you might have to go in through the side, and figure out who exactly to pay for your ticket. 

Context: The European Parliament, which doles out the bulk of parties’ funds, caps donations from any individual or entity at €18,000 annually. Here’s how the main parties handle this.

EPP — FOUNDATION DONATIONS: Last week in Bucharest, there was no way for corporates to sponsor the European People’s Party Congress itself. But the Martens Centre for European Studies was a whole other story, offering guest access to participants and sponsors of its sideline events. 

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Catching the buzz: The political foundation/think tank linked to Europe’s center-right political family boasted a space on the mezzanine of the plenary, just off the main entrance. You could come for the best coffee on site, brewed by Italian baristas, and stay for the policy gabfest. In addition to geeky debates with policy experts and national ministers on things like migration, defense, and “Navigating Between Climate Skepticism and Green Idealism,” there were also a series of one-on-one interviews with lobbying execs from Intel, Meta, Google, AT&T, AmCham EU and the pharma lobby EFPIA. A statement from the Martens Centre didn’t specify the price for these sponsorships, beyond affirming that they respect the €18,000 limit.

The Martens Centre namechecked sponsors in the program for its sideline events at the EPP Congress

ALDE — EVERYTHING BUT THE BIG ONE: The Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Party’s sponsorship system is pretty straightforward. But don’t be fooled: Even a full-service package might not include everything you expect.

Prix fixe or à la carte? EU Influence viewed a menu of sorts, sent to a consultancy, that offered a range of options: For €10,000 they could sponsor the annual party congress, another €5,000 to engage with the “Alliance of Her” program, and another €5,000 to sign up for “ALDE Party Organised Corporate Events in 2024.” Wait a second, you’re thinking, that totals €20,000, which goes over the cap. That’s where the package deal comes in: You get all this and more for €18,000.

Mind the fine print: Congress sponsorship includes access for up to five company reps for networking receptions and corporate roundtables, as well as the possibility of exhibition space. But an asterisk and fine print notes: “*Does not entitle representatives to any direct lobbying of elected politicians at congress.”

Big exception: ALDE is nominating its Spitzenkandidat at a special congress in Brussels later this month. But that’s not the congress on offer in the sponsorship package, the party stressed.

“During the election campaign, we are not doing partnerships,” said Iiris André, ALDE’s head of comms. That means “no corporate partners are present” at the “extraordinary” campaign kickoff congress on March 20 and 21. 

PES — YOU CAN COME, BUT YOU’RE NOT INVITED: The Party of European Socialists’ Rome gathering earlier in March did not have any sponsors, PES spokesman Robin Murphy told us. Progressive NGOs and trade unions that weighed in on the manifesto were invited to attend as guests. While the “overwhelming majority” of attendees to PES congresses are party activists or politicians, Murphy added, “as a matter of policy, we do not exclude representatives from any particular sector and access is always free of charge for all attendees.”

GREENS — YOU CAN COME, BUT WE MIGHT NOT LET YOU IN: The Greens’ congress in Lyon also did not accept sponsors. Nonetheless, my colleague Louise Guillot spotted a few corporate reps when she attended last month. Indeed, invitees primarily come from civil society but also include people from other European political parties and “interest groups that are closer to our cause,” a Greens spokesman told us. Sessions where Greens’ policies are negotiated are also limited to party members. Registration is broadly open, he said — but they’re keeping a close eye on the list: They’ve had to deny access to some in the past. 

ECR — WORKING VACATION: What a bargain! The ascendant European Conservatives and Reformists aren’t doing the whole manifesto-and-spitz thing. But even though they’re not holding a traditional party congress, you can still schmooze with key players away from home. The party has started offering travel packages filled with lectures,  sightseeing tours, policy panels and party bigwigs. There have already been trips to Washington (for the Conservative Political Action Conference, or CPAC) and Bucharest, and the last weekend in March features a trip to Cyprus. Just €310 gets you roundtrip flights, two nights in a single room and access to events featuring ECR lawmakers, Cypriot Energy Minister George Papanastasiou, and Italian Undersecretary of Defense Isabella Rauti. (Sadly, this version of the program suggests the appearance by MEP Nicola Procaccini, a close associate of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, will be online only.)

Your tax dollars at work: We don’t know how much access lobbyists (or journalists, for that matter) seeking some quality time with the next Parliament’s power players will actually have. But for the apparently subsidized price, it seems like the potential ROI is very high.

Credit where due: The information page for the ECR’s tours make no secret of how the trip is subsidized

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ETHICS BODY

COUNCIL’S FINAL COUNTDOWN: National diplomats have a tough choice to make about whether and how the Council will sign on to the EU ethics body. As we reported for Playbook, seven of the nine possible institutions are on board. The European Council is definitely out. That leaves the Council of the EU in limbo. The Belgian presidency, which wants to make something work, is making a last-ditch bid for a deal in Coreper, with Wednesday evening negotiations dragging into overtime today. 

Power struggle: The national ministers who set the agenda and chair meetings during the rotating Council presidency are beholden to national rules, the Council contends. That means they can’t sign on to the harmonized standards that the ethics body would agree on.

7 vs 1: That interpretation isn’t shared by other institutions. But in any case, the others argue that the Council shouldn’t be able to vote on the panel (and specifically hold veto power) if it’s not subject to those decisions. That would be “fake participation,” as MEP Daniel Freund put it to me. 

Yet as the Council sees it, being stripped of full membership rights relegates the capitals to second-class status. Member countries must be able to share this oversight of institutions paid out of the EU budget, the argument goes — especially since the member countries are the source of that EU budget. 

Blame game begins: EU Influence’s phone has been blowing up — as have those of her colleagues — since inter-institutional talks broke up late Tuesday night in Strasbourg. The Council is delusional, someone told us, for alienating all the other institutions by trying to join the body without submitting to it. A diplomatic source blamed the Commission for its clumsy maneuvering, threatening the legitimacy of the whole project by making it difficult for the Council to sign on.

Line of contention: Wording along the lines of “members of the body shall not prevent consensus on decisions that are not about them” is a no-go for the Council, the diplomat said.

What everyone agrees on: Everyone is frustrated with European Council President Charles Michel’s refusal to sign on. As we reported Tuesday, his office won’t be a member.

“The Cabinet of the President of the European Council consulted Member States but there was no consensus for the European Council to join the Ethics Body at this stage,” a Council representative said.

After EU Influence first reported Michel’s minimal engagement with the project in January, his team got more involved, we’ve heard, but always insisted that he didn’t have a mandate from EUCO to sign on. But that’s earned eyerolls from the other negotiators. The ethics body would set standards on post-mandate jobs, and the current European Council president is approaching the end of his mandate, prompting a diplomat to posit that the real resistance is “just because Charles Michel wants to keep his options open.” 

EPP rebellion: The European People’s Party’s top spokesman on the ethics body, MEP Sven Simon, is urging colleagues to reject the agreement, calling it “poorly drafted” and a “a frontal attack on the European Parliament from within.”

The EPP has consistently opposed an external ethics cop with any sort of teeth; nonetheless Simon’s statement is somewhat confusing because the EPP’s Salvatore De Meo, chair of the Constitutional Affairs Committee, was part of the Parliament’s three-member negotiating team that signed off on the agreement. De Meo’s office did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

TRICKS OF THE TRADE

LOBBYING + GDPR = IT’S COMPLICATED: A complete guide (in French) explores the way lobbyists can work within the limits of the EU’s data protection rules, or GDPR. The guide is written by French lobbyist associations in collaboration with the country’s data protection authority and decoded for you here by my Paris-based colleague Alexandre Léchenet (congratulate him on his new role, by the way). 

Stakeholder mapping at stake: In 2021, France’s National Commission on IT and Liberties (CNIL) fined Monsanto €400,000 for privacy violations. The agrichem giant didn’t inform politicians, journalists and others that their information was being logged in a lobbying file as part of that fundamental public affairs chore of stakeholder mapping. “The CNIL decision shook everyone up a bit, and there were several readings of it,” remembers Nicolas Bouvier, partner at Brunswick in Paris and VP of the French Association of Lobbying and Public Affairs Consultants (AFCL).

How to keep it kosher: The main concern of lobbyists was the scope of the right to be informed. The guide is quite reassuring for honest lobbyists: if the stakeholder mapping is created using only public information for well-known players, there’s no need to inform each one personally. The lobbyist should be safe with a general approach, like an email signature warning about possible data collection and redirecting to a data policy online.

No shrimp, please: The guide is full of examples of how nuances can help avoid breaches. Let’s say the rapporteur has a shrimp allergy. Don’t record that sensitive, health-related information. Instead, a simple “no shrimp” should suffice.

MORE NEWS

NGO WINS DOCUMENT ACCESS CASE: The Council of the EU can’t use the fact there were ongoing international negotiations on an issue as an argument to refuse to provide the opinion of its legal services on the matter to the public, the EU’s top court said Wednesday in a win for legal charity ClientEarth. Ruling here. Analysis here from Päivi Leino-Sandberg, a law professor working on the case.

CIVIL SOCIETY PILES ON AMAZON: More than 20 labor unions and NGOs called today for a “comprehensive ban” of Amazon, following the Parliament’s rare move to deactivate the e-commerce giant’s 14 lobbyist badges. They argue that Amazon reps should be barred from entering the Parliament as guests and that MEPs should refuse to meet with the company at other locations.

PARTY HOPPING

BRUSSELS BUBBLE CUP — CHAMPS AGAIN: [Full disclosure: The following was written by two of the victorious team members] POLITICO’s football team emerged victorious from the latest edition of the Brussels Bubble Cup last Friday night, beating a raft of top EU consultancies to win the glittering trophy. Vlad Hosu, Ioannis Rallis and Nicolas Camut were the stars of the show as the POLITICO team took down #SustainableHub 3-1 in the final. Alex Braley scored a consolation goal for the green super-team. 

Back of the net(working): As always, BCW Global gave it their best shot, but came up short against POLITICO in the semifinal for the second tournament running. (Better luck next time.) Also joining the competition were teams from FTI Consulting, Hanbury Strategy, Edelman, Rud Pedersen Public Affairs, APCO Worldwide, Fourtold and Penta. The tournament was a fundraiser for Kick Cancer. 

BRUSSELS BINDER — TIES THAT DON’T BIND: Jeeez, girlfriends, we volunteer our time to moderate an event for you, and then you don’t invite us to the Brussels Binder Women’s Day party at the Dutch perm rep? Maybe you need to update that eponymous binder. 

**The 2024 Maastricht Debate is approaching quickly. Questions at the debate will focus on three key themes, climate change, foreign and security policy and EU democracy. Interested in knowing what the candidates think? Register today to watch the highly anticipated debate.**

INFLUENCERS

CHEMICALS

— Francesco Gattiglio has been promoted to vice president of external affairs, EU at Albemarle Corporation.

CONSULTING & COMMS

— Andrew Johnson joined BOLDT’s Brussels office as a partner. He was previously with Rud Pedersen Public Affairs.

— Baptiste Carriere-Pradal has partnered with Boston Consulting Group as a senior adviser for EU sustainability legislation. He is a co-founder and director of 2B Policy.

— Felix Kubitschek joined the lobby shop EPPA as a public affairs consultant, via AbbVie. 

DIPLOMACY

— Vanja Filipovic is the new head of mission of Bosnia and Herzegovina to NATO. Filipovic was previously ambassador to the U.K. 

MANUFACTURING

— APEAL, the Association of European Producers of Steel for Packaging, appointed Metka Cavka Luciani as its head of EU affairs. She was previously with Weber Shandwick.

THINK TANKS

— Maja Fjaestad is joining the European Policy Centre as senior adviser on health care and digital health. She is a former Swedish state secretary for health and social affairs.

— Florian Cortez started as a joint research fellow at the European Policy Centre and EGMONT-Royal Institute for International Relations. He was a director of Climate & AI at Ethicqual.

THANKS TO: Barbara Moens, Louise Guillot, Ali Walker, Ioannis Rallis, Alexandre Léchenet and especially Ketrin Jochecová; web producer Giulia Poloni and my editor Paul Dallison.

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