A story of power and elevators from Strasbourg

BONJOUR dear readers. In Jane Austen novels — or, more recently, Bridgerton — intrigue happens during big summer parties where courtship, envy and power collide while wearing fancy clothes. It was pretty much the same when the little bubble of Brussels took a four-hour train ride to Strasbourg for the inaugural session of the European Parliament — with fewer flowery gowns and romantic drama. 

If you’ll allow me to continue with the analogy, the hundreds of new European lawmakers are like the débutantes, hoping their names will be heard by potential allies — or even journalists — who will help them secure political success, while amused advisers, lobbyists or NGO advocates try pulling the strings for their interests in the hopes of finding a place in EU high society. 

The elevator pitch, literally. But as well as the old-fashioned courtship rituals, there’s one modern take on influence that really had us thinking. A lobbyist gave me his tip: wait next to the elevators at the European Parliament just as the plenary session ends so you can bump into MEPs. Potentially with champagne. Of course, it’s reminiscent of a well-known start-up habit from Silicon Valley, in which entrepreneurs sneak into elevators with investors to grab their undivided attention (and millions). It also echoes a fascinating rumor about a certain EU commissioner who’s allegedly obsessed with being alone in elevators, even asking advisers to keep them waiting while he attends meetings. I sort of understand why. 

**A message from GIZ & Enabel: The European Union needs to stay engaged in fragile contexts. In a joint article, Thorsten Schäfer-Gümbel, Chair of the Board of GIZ, and Jean Van Wetter, CEO of the Belgian development agency Enabel, point out that international development organisations play an essential role in supporting fragile states.**

Today we’re talking about:

— Von der Leyen was grilled on transparency matters but had some answers

— The juiciest declaration of interests of our new MEPs

— How Germany tightens rules around lobbying

— How Chinese companies found their way into another Big Tech lobby in Brussels

THE GRILLING OF VON DER LEYEN

NOT A WORD FOR THE LOBBIES. In her bid to win support for a second term, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Thursday morning handed out a wide range of policy gifts to the political groups in the European Parliament and addressed some of their concerns. However, she did not say the words “lobby” or “Pfizer”, which were central to the criticism from far-left and far-right groups as the debate unfolded in the Strasbourg hemicycle (both were keen to mention ongoing litigation against the Commission boss related to the so-called “Pfizergate” and the Commission’s lack of transparency). She however pointed to some of the concerns mentioned in an open letter from four transparency NGOs who urged her to act on enforcing lobbying rules if she gets elected.

What she said on corruption and transparency: “We became democrats of comfort. But today our democracies are under threat,” von der Leyen said before listing the war in Ukraine, cases of spying, cyber-attacks, corruption, and disinformation by foreign actors.

How will it translate: If she gets elected, von der Leyen pledged to bring in a European Democracy Shield package that would enforce its “own dedicated structure for countering foreign information manipulation and interference.” It would also include measures to “impose transparency on foreign funding of our public life as a common rule, but also to guarantee a reliable information framework.”

European FBI, here we go: She warned that “organized criminal networks are infiltrating our economy; most of them [using] corruption,” and also pledged to double staff levels at Europol and turn it into a “truly operational police agency.”

VERY INTERESTED MEPS

NEW DECLASSIFIED INFO JUST DROPPED. It’s crunch time for those who, like us, love searching for lawmakers’ little secrets. The public declarations of private interests of MEPs were published on Tuesday. My colleague Louise Guillot and I looked into the 39 people who are running the show as president, political group chairs, vice presidents and quaestors — don’t worry, we’ll get to the others later.

But first, a complaint. While pledging transparency, the Parliament makes no effort to give an insightful overview of the profiles of MEPs: you have to search each MEP’s page one by one, look for a PDF file and … translate it, as lawmakers can file their declarations in any of the EU official languages. It’s hilarious to think that even with the EU’s army of interpreters, globish speakers and professionals with automatic translation tools and Excel files, the Parliament still finds a way to make it hard for civil society to get info about their representatives.

OK, it’s not that bad: There has been some improvement. We now have more details about exactly how much money MEPs have made from their side gigs during the past three years. In the last term, MEPs could declare vague income brackets for side jobs. While some are now detailing everything (like Antonella Sberna), there are more reluctant approaches and we also spotted some mistakes. Here are three takeaways:

— The vast majority of top MEPs are political professionals: Some 76 percent of this group were elected officials before, which shows that political groups prefer experience when putting forward people for the Parliament’s top jobs.

— Around a quarter declare making money outside of their main gig, with at least three getting more than €10,000 a month. Former Belgian Prime Minister Sophie Wilmès declared the biggest such revenue during the past three years.

— The representation of public interests, at first, does not seem that strong: Only two out of 39 have declared revenue coming from the private sector in the past three years. Many are however connected to private interests through think tanks and memberships of various public-private associations. Only two have declared working with NGOs in the past two years (Socialist MEP Pina Picierna, who founded REA Reagire alla violenza, and Green MEP Bas Eickhout, who is a member of the Dutch association for the protection of birds).

Now let’s get into the juicy part:

1. Manfred Weber has a lot of hobbies. If you were wondering how much the EPP president gets every month, now you know: €14,120. That is on top of his MEP allowance of around €8,000 net. The Bavarian politician also has another 11 non-paid side jobs in politics that he thoroughly declared (including membership of the Bavarian Harbour Forum, Bayern Munich football club, Germany’s Central Committee of Catholics, Pool Billard Club Wildenberg, and Donum Vitae). Weber was contacted for comment and did not immediately respond.

2. Jordan Bardella can’t make that much money. Marine Le Pen’s protégé requires …protection. According to his declaration, the far-right National Rally gives Bardella a chauffeur while security company Gallice — run by a former French secret service agent — provides two full-time security agents. Weirdly enough, Bardella doesn’t get money from his job as president of his party and regional councilor: we’ve asked our top French colleague Alexandre Léchenet for an explanation, and it’s because France only allows politicians to have side jobs with a threshold of €9,015 a month. Bardella was contacted for comment and did not immediately respond.

3. Hard right ideas and tourism mix well for Nicola Proccaccini. The hard-right MEP who had Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni at his wedding declared a €9,000 annual revenue from the rental of a bed and breakfast establishment he owns. In case you were thinking of booking, it’s “a flat in his hometown that they rent out to tourists via Airbnb during the summer,” his adviser told us by email.

4. Katarina Barley is also a coach for executives. The socialist German MEP declares many non-paid memberships and functions in institutes and think tanks. But most importantly, she quotes Meg Ryan in the rom-com “You’ve Got Mail” on her executive coaching website, before advertising her conflict resolution skills, for which she declared €5,000 per year in revenue. The company, founded with her husband, when she was already an MEP, has worked for Omniworld Almere and a lawyer who is listed in the German lobbyists registry.

What she says: “I take the obligation of transparency very seriously … These memberships and functions are means to stay in contact with civil society in my constituency and beyond. As a rule, they entail only punctual obligations that neither give rise to conflicts of interest nor stand in the way of the conscientious fulfillment of the mandate,” Barley told us by mail.

“The company mentioned was founded as a project of my husband, a professional sports coach, and myself. The core idea of the business centres around coaching and team building, without any connection to policy-making,” she added. “We conduct individual coaching and team building. As my mandate always comes first, my husband attended to all but one client exclusively.”

5. Victor Negrescu’s Schrödinger’s membership of business-friendly association. The socialist Romanian MEP declares he is a member of Knowledge4Innovation, a Belgian association that listed Eurogas, Shell and the European Heating Oil Association among its board members until 2023, and still has the European Crop Protection Association as well as the European Chemical Industry Council among its administrators.

What he says: Negrescu’s assistant forwarded us a letter from the association saying he “has not been involved in K4I activities during the past two years and that he is not a member of the organisation.”

6. Martin Hojsík’s side consultancy: Just before becoming an MEP in 2019, the Renew MEP set up a consultancy in his homeland of Slovakia, which he told us helped him “offering consultancy services to civil society” after having worked for Greenpeace International and ActionAid International. According to public financial records, the company’s revenues have been non-existent since he got elected. Hojsík said it would remain dormant for now but that he might revive it once leaving politics. 

Did we miss anything? We’re just starting but don’t hesitate to share tips by email.

GERMANY TIGHTENS RULES AROUND LOBBYING (AGAIN)

IT’S A CRIME! The practice of paid lobbying at ministries or other public bodies by mandate holders is now subject to criminal prosecution in Germany, according to a new regulation that came in reaction to the “mask deals” concluded during the coronavirus pandemic.

It may come as a surprise but: During the pandemic, members of the German Bundestag and the Bavarian state parliament established contacts between mask manufacturers and decision-makers in federal and state authorities, in some cases getting consultancy fees in return. This caused a major stir in Germany but did not lead to any judicial consequences as the anti-corruption laws were not designed for it. 

Now what? The new criminal offense applies to all cases in which mandate holders exploit their connections with public bodies for the benefit of a company in return for payment, meaning that it’s pretty vast, lawyers from Baker & McKenzie warn in a note. “It will hence be vital for companies to critically review lecture and consultancy fees for mandate holders as well as remuneration for supervisory board positions and managing director activities for their appropriateness with immediate effect.”

Why should I care as an EU lobbyist? Well, this new criminal offense also works for those who might be willing to hire German MEPs as consultants.

TECH LOBBY CORNER

LOOKING EAST FOR NEW PLATFORMS: As a flurry of new EU digital laws starts being enforced, tech lobby group Dot Europe is determined to ramp up its influence by representing many popular online platforms — including those from China, like Alibaba. 

The lobby association, founded in 2000 to represent the “leading internet companies in Europe”, has grown to represent 22 companies including many online platforms that fall under new rules like the Digital Services Act (DSA) — it represents the likes of Meta and Google, for instance — my colleague Clothilde Goujard reports. 

Its new Director General Constantin Gissler insisted the association wants to remain “focused.” It’s also not discounting firms with China ties as new members “as long as they play by the rules” to speak on behalf of a “broad sector.” 

First TikTok, now Alibaba: After taking on TikTok, whose parent company ByteDance is based in China, in mid-2020, Dot Europe last month welcomed tech firm Alibaba.

Growing scrutiny: Alibaba hasn’t gotten as much scrutiny about its ties to China as other firms like Huawei and TikTok, but recently its online marketplace AliExpress, with its over 104 million European users, has fallen under the supervision of the European Commission. 

It has also been under investigation by the Commission since March over potential infringements of nearly a dozen obligations under the DSA, as regulators and consumer protection groups scale up their challenges on e-commerce companies. 

Open mind: “It’s really important to try to separate a little bit the bigger geopolitics from the day-to-day policy that we work on,” said Gissler in an interview with Morning Tech. “If European users are using them, then in principle, we have the ambition that we can speak with these companies also.” 

“We can’t throw them all into one box: when you look at the only company so far that was blocked in one country, it actually was an American one in France,” he said, referring to a government order in 2021 to force search engines and app stores to take down U.S. online marketplace Wish over unsafe products. 

Gissler declined to say if other Chinese firms like Temu had contacted Dot Europe. “But if they ever were to then we’ll definitely have the discussion,” he said.

MEP SWITCH: LobbyLeaks, an MEP-supported campaign group fighting “shady” Big Tech lobbying, is getting a new ambassador. The Dutch EU lawmaker Paul Tang is leaving the Parliament and passing the baton to Greens/EFA member Daniel Freund (a former campaigner at Transparency International), the group said in an email.

Here are things we heard at our POLITICO welcome party for MEPs:

“After the [von der Leyen] vote, I just want to go home and disappear for a month” — a prominent political adviser who’s just had enough.

“Oh sorry I have to go see this MEP, I want to turn him into a client” — a lobbyist who left us puzzled.

“I think it’s a former commissioner but even when she was at the Commission, I couldn’t remember her name” — a journalist who couldn’t care less. 

HEADLINES

— U.S. firm in Malta scandal paid spies $1.6M before declaring bankruptcy (OCCRP)

— Dalli, bruised by Barroso, vows to keep up fight for justice after Kessler conviction (Malta Today)

— Le discret réseau chinois pour capter les technologies françaises (Le Point)

— European Public Prosecutor’s Office opens investigation into MEP Hilde Vautmans (Knack), Tom Vandendriessche (Le Soir)

INFLUENCERS

CONSULTANCIES

Anamaria Corca joined Considerati, leading public affairs in the Brussels office. She was previously with Europe Médialab.

Rasmussen Global is expanding its communications advisory team in Brussels with Cameron McNeill joining from Ottawa as senior communications adviser.

Redouan Abdelali has started as recruitment consultant at Morrison Finance. He was previously with Axis Group.

DIPLOMACY

Dilarde Teilāne, currently political adviser at the European External Action Service’s delegation to Pakistan, is joining the EU delegation to the UN in Geneva in September. 

After more than 4 years as minister counsellor at the Swedish Embassy in Rome, Niklas Wiberg takes up his new position at the Swedish Embassy in Malaysia on August 15.

After 5.5 years working for as policy officer the Netherlands’ Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Policy, Thorsten Roobeek will start at the Dutch embassy in Jakarta on July 22, where he will be focusing on climate, energy and raw materials.

Sophie van Huut’s posting as second secretary at the Dutch Embassy in Indonesia has come to an end; on August 19, she will start her new position in the International Trade Policy Department at the Netherlands’ Ministry of Foreign Affairs in The Hague. 

Pablo López-Alvarez has been re-elected president of the Spanish Chamber of Commerce in Belgium and Luxembourg

Christoph Wolfrum is taking over as the German Foreign Office’s director general for European affairs from Sibylle Sorg, who will serve as Berlin’s new ambassador to Turkey. 

ENERGY

Paul Kenny becomes the new director general of the European Heat Pump Association (EHPA). He was previously the policy advisor to the Irish climate and energy Minister.

PHARMA

Matthieu-Isaac Godelet-Gasana has been promoted to recruiter at Catalent Pharma Solutions.

Special thanks to: Louise Guillot, Pieter Haeck, Clothilde Goujard, Sarah Wheaton, Laurens Cerulus, my editor Paul Dallison and Šejla Ahmatović.

**A message from GIZ & Enabel: The European Union needs to stay engaged in fragile contexts. In a joint article, Thorsten Schäfer-Gümbel, Chair of the Board of GIZ, and Jean Van Wetter, CEO of the Belgian development agency Enabel, point out that international development organisations play an essential role in supporting fragile states. As we live in an interconnected, increasingly complex and fragile world, we will be affected by African crises, but we will also benefit from Africa's growth opportunities.  Our European responsibility should lead us to remain alert and engaged, and to play a constructive role on the international stage and in multilateral fora, contributing to common and shared solutions in addressing fragility, as Team Europe. It is therefore crucial that the European Parliament and the European Commission pay the necessary political attention to this issue. This attention must be accompanied by adequate funding for action in fragile contexts. This work benefits both the affected countries and the European citizens.**

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