Mairead McGuinness Fine Gael MEP

A move to improve transparency in the workings of EU institutions has, unfortunately, been stymied by an ill thought through new report that was actually intended to improve on good existing rules around transparency for EU citizens.

The European Parliament is the most transparent of all EU institutions. Agendas and legislative documents, including amendments, are available online prior to any vote. Members of the public can follow committee and plenary proceedings in person or via live web-streaming. Voting results are published, including details of which MEPs voted and how they voted in the case of roll-call votes.

But that is not the case for all EU institutions. Amendment is needed to the Regulation governing access to documents of these institutions and agencies.

A new report on revision of the Regulation failed to achieve a compromise position satisfactory to all political groupings in the Parliament in December 2011. This report was authored by Michael Cashman MEP, for whom I have the greatest respect.

Mr Cashman’s first report was discussed over two years ago and, despite several attempts, cross-party compromise agreement was not reached. The Lisbon Treaty then came into effect and reinforced the commitment of EU institutions to greater transparency. The Treaty requires that the Regulation on access to documents is updated to comply with the Treaty. The European Commission subsequently tabled new proposals with a view to increasing transparency.

The 2011 Cashman report brings together the Commission’s 2008 and 2011 proposals. While it quite rightly prioritises transparency, it goes too far and actually poses a potential threat to the smooth working of the Parliament. The text confuses ‘access to documents’ with ‘administrative procedures’ and goes beyond the remit of its legal base. This also puts into question the inter-institutional agreement on the use of classified material.

When assessing what was being proposed we also had to give due consideration to the protection of privacy, data protection and the protection of commercial secrets and sensitive data, such as information used in court proceedings, competition cases and documents relating to EU staff.

The Cashman report should have clearly defined what the term ‘documents’ was intended to cover. This was relayed to the report’s author in a bid to agree on a revised text that all MEPs could support. Unfortunately, the amendments suggested were not sufficient. My Fine Gael colleagues and I were placed in an impossible position. We decided not to vote against the report since we were in agreement with the main thrust of it but we abstained on the basis of our concerns.

During the debate on the Cashman report on December 14th, 2011, the Commissioner for Institutional Affairs, Maroš Šefčovič, spoke against the Cashman report and said that the Commission cannot agree to its terms. The Council has also taken a negative view making it highly unlikely that it will be adopted.

Commissioner Šefčovič stated: “The implementation of the legal obligations under the Lisbon Treaty, the actual creation of a new right for citizens, is now being postponed until the three institutions agree on full-scale review of the regulation.

“In the meantime citizens will have no full, formal access to documents coming, for example, from the European Council or the External Action Service. This agreement risks taking time and I am afraid that, given the amendments proposed in the report, agreement on changes to the regulations is not within reach. I cannot of course anticipate the position the Council will take on the proposed amendments but many of them cannot be accepted by the Commission.”

Transparency is of the utmost importance. It is regrettable that no realistic and practical agreed text was agreed. As a result the path to greater transparency has been delayed needlessly.

You can view the text of the report Public access to European Parliament, Council and Commission documents here.  Choose Thursday, 15 December ‘Texts Adopted’.