SHINING A LIGHT ON EUROPEAN LOBBIES
TOWARDS A GREATER TRANSPARENY, INTEGRITY AND PARTICIPATION IN LOBBING
Spain’s extortionate Sunshine Tax is “a final solution for renewable energy”: What do the documents tell us?
Madrid, 19 May 2016 - On the day that the news is full of the fact that Portugal this month had four straight days of zero emissions energy production using renewable sources (full story here), documents obtained by Access Info Europe using Spain’s Transparency Law reveal the tense political battles behind a controversial 2015 law that imposes prohibitive taxes on
Spain: NGOs go to court to obtain documents about lobbying on a controversial energy law
Madrid 12 May 2016 – Two Spanish NGOs are challenging in court a decision by the Transparency Council granting only partial access to lobby documents submitted during elaboration of a controversial 2015 Law that imposes prohibitive taxes on use of home-produced energy (such as from solar power). Access Info Europe and the Platform for a New Energy Model in December
Will Timmermans really shed light on lobbying in Brussels?
This article was originally published by ALTER-EU. Brussels, 18 April 2016 - Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans' launch in March of a consultation to improve the EU lobby register came seven months late. Does it herald a genuine step forward towards improved lobby transparency in Brussels? A database of organisations working to influence EU legislation, the European transparency register was designed
Member state offices in Brussels wide open to corporate lobbyists
Brussels/Madrid, 22 March 2016 – Corporate lobbyists enjoy widespread access to member state representations by exploiting loopholes in EU transparency rules according to the first ever study on lobbying activities at national government offices in Brussels.[1] The study, ‘National representations in Brussels: open for corporate lobbyists’ by the Alliance for Lobbying Transparency and Ethics Regulation (ALTER-EU), reveals how these government
Civil society expose holes in EU lobby transparency rules
This post was originally published by ALTER-EU. Madrid/Brussels, 17 December 2015 - Research by ALTER-EU member groups Corporate Europe Observatory, Access Info Europe and Friends of the Earth Europe shows that well over 90 per cent of meetings between DG FISMA (the Commission's department for financial regulation) officials not covered by transparency rules and lobbyists are with the corporate sector.
Lobbying Transparency via RTI Laws
This document sets out the classes of information that should be made available by public bodies in order to get a full picture of the influence of interest groups, particularly lobbyists, on governmental and legislative decision making. You can download the report in PDF and in Word . If you have any comments about the contents of this report, we
Cover photo: European Council via Flick (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0)