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CONT European Parliament
Follow its sittingsDirk Gotink
So I look forward to those exchanges. And, I would give over the floor to Carlo also for his short opening remarks.
Carlo Fidanza
Thank you, chair. I will speak in Italian, so I don't think you need it because our new chair is a perfect Italian. Thank.
You, chair. Congratulations on being elected. Welcome. Yes. I'd just like to add a few words to what member Gottink said.
I'd like to thank our guests here today. We thought it was a good idea to go into more detail on this point on Sineer, because we've already had a look at some very interesting and useful information on that. We've also just had a new batch of contracts, which has given us new food for thought, which today we'd like to go into more detail. We'd like to look more closely at this work, see how it's gone, and then look at the guidelines from May 24. Together with DG budget, we'd like to continue this way of looking at the working of Sineo.
And then there's also the recent document that the president sent a few days ago to the commission, and it would be very useful to have an answer to the many questions in that letter. Then we're also looking at a new impetus for our multi-annual financial framework. There are due to be funds allocated under the AGRA program and other programs. And we think on the basis of the evidence that we have that we won't be able to carry out that expenditure in the same way. We want to make sure that all of this is done in a transparent way, and that any activities that are outside of the planned scope should not be continued.
Andreas Schwab
Then we'll be able to talk about that after we've heard from our guests. Thank you. Thank you, Carlo.
Now turn our concentration to what our guests will have to say. And I think I should give the floor first to Miss Paloma Abagarote. Over to you.
Speaker 8
Good afternoon, honorable members of the European Parliament, esteemed colleagues. Thank you for inviting me to the fourth meeting of the Structunity Working Group of the con committee on the financing of NGOs and other n.
Can you take your headset off, please?
We my
I knew you very well.
Speaker 9
Okay. Good. In my first appearance during the first meeting in November 2025, you already show interest also in the evaluation process for the life program and in the contracting and management of experts, which has also been confirmed with the latest questions addressed to commissioner Roswell and commissioner Hoexstra, and for which you just have received a reply this afternoon. Maybe they are not still in your hands. We just want to reinstate that we are fully committed to addressing and clearing out any concerns you may have.
The purpose of my introduction now is to provide you with some insights on the decision-making flow for the life program, and particularly on the evaluation process, with the purpose of clarifying the different steps and roles of the actors in this process. Before doing so, I would like to underline that life is a competitive program. Grants are awarded following open calls for proposals and a strict evaluation procedure. The life evaluation procedure is similar or identical to other procedures following other programs in CINEEA in other services of the commission. It is based on the financial regulation, the life regulation, the life multi-annual work program, and the calls for proposals, and it guarantees full transparency and equal treatment.
You can move to the next slide, please. The starting point is the life program regulation of the European Parliament and the Council, which establishes, amongst other, the eligible actions and eligible entities and guidance on the work criteria. On the basis of the LIFE regulation, the European Commission is responsible for drafting the work program, which in the case of LIFE covers several years. It adopts the work program after the opinion of the live committee of the council, and it's also subject to the scrutiny of the European Parliament. CINEIA prepares the call documents, which are the documents announcing the conditions of the call, as well as the submission requirements and the work criteria already specified in the multi-annual work program adopted by the commission.
These documents are sent to the commission for consultation. After the date of the call closure, CINEA is responsible for organizing the valuation procedure, which consists in admissibility checks and the valuation of proposals with the assistance or not of independent experts, but also with the involvement of the European Commission. The evaluation procedure ends with CINEA informing the applicants whether successful or not, and with the signature of the grant agreements after the work decision is adopted. Let's have a closer look at the evaluation procedure itself, and the roles that experts, CINEEA, and the commission have in this process. Please, next slide.
The use of experts to assist the commission and executive agents in the evaluation of grant applications is a common practice. The engagement of such experts can be done via individual contracts, further to a call for expression of interest or via a procurement contract. In the case of Life, we use both procedures, but the role of the experts is the same. In the case of using the procurement, the role of our framework contractor is of a middle person, meaning that they assist CINEIA in the logistics and administrative tasks without taking any decision in the evaluation of proposals. When it comes to the selection of experts, either from the call of expression of interest of the commission or from the call of expression of interest launched by the contractor, CINEA has the final say.
The selection of experts is made on the basis of their knowledge and professional experience, but we also take other elements such as geographical balance, diverse profiles, and rotation, which can finally influence the selection of experts. The declaration and verification of conflict of interest is performed several times in the procedure. First, prior to the initial allocation of experts to the proposals, and on the basis of the curriculum vitae and other information available to CINE or to the contractor. The expert is allocated to a proposal, and therefore, an expert will not be allocated to any proposal where she or he has a contractual or labor relationship with the entity making the proposal. Second, once the initial allocation of proposals is made, the experts have to declare whether or not they have a conflict of interest.
This is also very important because there are aspects that cannot be seen in a curriculum vitae. Sinea reviews the declarations, can take additional verifications, and then take decisions and mitigating measures, such as excluding the expert for evaluating a specific proposal or even going beyond, such as excluding the expert for evaluating all proposals for a specific topic or removing the expert completely from the valuation of the call. Once the situations of conflict of interest are sorted out, the contracts are signed and the valuation starts. When we look into the evaluation procedure itself, we can divide it in three steps. The first one, experts assess the proposals individually and produce an individual report containing the scores and justifications.
The second step, experts evaluate proposals meet in a consensus meeting in order to reach an agreement on the assessment of the proposals. These panels are chaired by Cineo. The results of these meetings is a final consensus report for each proposal and a draft ranking list, which is based on the points given to the proposals for each award criterion. The third and final step is the evaluation committee. The financial regulation establishes that the minimum number of members is three, but usually, our evaluation committees have a large number of members composed exclusively by staff of CINEEA and the commission.
All of them have to sign an absence of conflict-of-interest declaration. The members of the committee have a discussion on the proposals and the ranking list to reach a final decision, which consists of a recommendation of the proposals to be funded as well as those projected. The members of the committee have, prior to the meeting, access to all the proposals, the individual assessments, as well as the consensus reports. And based on the recommendation and the draft list, the authorizing officer in Sinea takes the final decision. Next slide.
Speaker 9
In a nutshell, am convinced that the evaluation procedure used for evaluation of proposals for life program is solid as objective criteria or objective award criteria are established in the multi-annual work program adopted by the commission and transposed in the call document, which are all public. Ensures a wide publication of expert recruitment for contracting opportunities and a regular rotation of experts. ZYNEA also ensures that the best available experts are recruited, as the selection criteria are strict and require a high level of expertise. Experts also receive adequate training on how the valuation system works, and particularly on how to use the criteria. Independence and absence of conflict of interest of experts and staff is ensured throughout the process.
And finally, the evaluation of the committee is composed of CINEEA and the European Commission staff only who are the ones who make the final recommendation. So I trust that this information, together with the written replies from the commissioner and Roswell to your letter of last 27 February, will help you to understand better this process. Thank you.
Andreas Schwab
Thank you so much, Miss Aba Garote. This has been helpful. I would now like to give the floor again to call our coauthors of the report for their questions. And as a reminder, we have also with us Pietri Sans Redrado from DG Budget and Miss Ragustina Parenti from the transparency register. I will ask the speakers to answer immediately after each member, before we move to the next.
So, over to you again. Dirk, over to you.
Dirk Gotink
Thank you very much. Thank you very much, chair. Well, the secretariat has just circulated to us a 15-page reply to your wonderful letter that we sent. I can't remember when we sent it, but it was several weeks ago. I'm quite sure.
So, obviously, we haven't been able to go into detail into that. It's very unfortunate. It would have been helpful to have that with a couple of days' notice. But you know what? We talked about this also last time, and it was about the conflicts of interest.
And actually, that there was an impression, and I was definitely not the only one, that the role of experts is quite significant in Ciner. And actually, the visibility we have on who we're talking about is very limited. Because also, if I look at the flowchart that you just showed us, and it was very complex, but it basically tells me, okay. Sinea guards the process, but the qualitative analysis is done by experts. So the real in-depth degrading of the contracts that they that are or the proposals that are being made.
So that makes the persons involved in this selection procedure extremely influential, and it makes them extremely important. Now, you have or we have asked for an overview of, I think, it was the years '23 and '24 of experts. And we also did LinkedIn searches. And many of them are quite transparent about what kind of environment they come from. And, of course, you cannot be expert in, let's say, energy policy if you worked all your life in road maintenance works.
So I can understand that there's somehow some connection to that. But to what extent, how do you check if someone has experience in NGOs and this person can then also evaluate the same contracts that will be financing those same NGOs? Is that theoretically possible? Question mark.
Speaker 9
The first question is about the profiles and the experience required for the experts. I understand that you have not had the time to look at our replies, but in our reply, we have included the relevant experience that is required for the different profiles. In the case of operating brands, we are requiring an excellent knowledge of European Union environmental and/or climate action policy. We asked them to understand the process behind the development and implementation of European Union environment and climate policy and the role that NGOs are playing in the process. And then as a group, because we want to have a diverse profile, the group of experts must cover all the topics relevant to love, nature, and biodiversity, circular economy, and quality of life, climate change mitigation and adaptation.
So we don't necessarily need people who have worked in an NGO. In fact, when we look into the profiles of the last.
call.
Speaker 9
For the framework partnership agreements, these profiles were different. We had 22 pure people, 22% of us of the experts who were self-employed, 39% of people who are working presently in the private sector, 22% working in public bodies, and then also 17% working for nonprofit organizations, which do not mean that they are working for NGOs, but they are working for foundations, trusts, and, for example, associations could be.
Dirk Gotink
So my understanding is then that it is theoretically possible that that happens? My question. No. Okay. Well, that's a short answer.
You say it's not possible.
Speaker 9
What is not possible is that there is a person working for an NGO who will evaluate a proposal for the same NGO. And also given the high number of experts that we are using, we don't. I mean, it's a conflict of interest having somebody who works for an NGO and evaluate a proposal for the same NGO.
Dirk Gotink
Thank you. That's clear. And we also know that these are usually their networks organized in a very collaborative way. It is part of their effectiveness over the past 10 years is the way that they're organized. So, we're not saying directly or I'm not saying directly.
I mean, it obviously will be a flagrant conflict if the person was actually working at the same job. I'm saying, if you come from there or if you have or that NGO is related to the same network of NGOs where you have experience, we found that at least 30% of the people that were on the list of experts that you provided us, which was a limited list, have a history in those networks. And I'm sure that they also signed a declaration of non conflict of interest. And then my question is, what are the internal procedures? How do you check it?
Has it ever happened that you have refused the experts? Because I've also checked, you can earn over $9,090,000 euros over a four-year time being an expert. You know what? I would like to become an expert maybe in the future because it is almost an interesting job. So, first of all, they're paid.
Secondly, they come from areas where they might have relations to an expert. I mean, we know how these networks are organized. So could you please answer how it has happened that you have refused experts? And what are the procedures in place to deal with these networks and not a direct employment situation, just the networks, the environment?
Speaker 9
Okay. So how do we ensure that experts do not have conflict of interest? The first thing that, as I was, you know, trying to explain before, is that in addition to the self-declaration of the expert, we, and when we use a framework contractor, they as well, consist of checking not only the expert CV, but also we do extra checks on the experts before contracting them. So information, for example, based on the experts' LinkedIn account, unknown premium research collaborations, memberships in stakeholder networks, and other publicly available sources. So we do check.
What we do, and you may have seen experts who could have worked in an NGO, but they can evaluate many other parts of the life program. The list is very long. I mean, we have almost 1000 proposals every year. The Life, we also would like to underline that we have a conflict of interest manual related specifically to the Life program, which contains detailed provisions, and this has been shared with the contractors and the experts. The manual provides, you know, detailed procedures on how to ensure confidential, but also fair and equitable evaluation of the life program.
We also have measures. As I say, there are different measures that we can take. We can take the measure of removing the expert to evaluate a specific proposal. We can also take the measures of removing the expert to evaluate the calls on a specific topic. We can also have measures of not contracting the expert for that evaluation.
There are also potential measures that if we discover a breach of absence of conflict of interest, you know, the expert will no longer be recruited by, or employed, not staff, but that contracted in the future evaluation. And there are also penalties for such behavior. Thank you, Miss Abar. Yeah.
Speaker 9
I think that you also referred to €90,000, that experts could earn. €90,000 would require that an expert works 220 days. This is not a year in that period, which is not possible. I mean, we don't require such a number of days because the remuneration of expert has been fixed by the commission at €450 per day, and this is what they have been getting for at least the last 10 years.
Andreas Schwab
No. I mean, miss Abba, I'm new to this job as you have heard, but I would like to, following that conversation, ask you, and this is not a provocation because I'm absolutely aware that you can only control what you know. But may I ask you, following up on this question, are you able to exclude that the same experts have been coming from one project to another one, thereby avoiding to judge their own project, but changing from one to another project quite often so that there is some sort of community of experts that always give positive comments on the neighbors' projects. It's only a question that came in relation to the presentation I have been following now. I don't know if you can answer this, but that would be my question for you.
Speaker 9
The experts that we are using, they are not always the same. We have what we call a rotation exercise by which a percentage of experts rotate. And they also not only that we get new experts, and I think, has been around 25% on a yearly basis. But, also, we make sure that they are not always evaluating the proposals from the same entities, I would say.
Carlo Fidanza
Thank you. Could I just chime in here? Because, first of all, allow me to extend my greetings to the director. But if an expert has worked for an NGO in a particular sector and then this expert has to deal with projects from another sector, that would not be a reason which would necessarily lead to that expert being excluded from that particular project. Obviously, that assessment criteria and everybody's eligible, and it will never be possible to exclude anybody because clearly, with a cross financing mechanism or whatever you like to call it, if there are interconnections, links within the same environment, it is just common sense.
You wouldn't come along and present yourself as an expert in the programs which you've done or on the programs you've done up to then. This wouldn't be considered a reason for exclusion, which potentially could lead to an area where there would always be conflicts of interest, where the mechanisms used up to now would not necessarily have avoided this phenomenon. But allow me to go on to a different topic. I don't think that we're satisfied with the replies which we've heard so far. Sorry, I would just like to go back to what our colleague, Gauteng, was saying, that we just received the reply just a few minutes ago to a very important letter.
And I think that this won't happen in the future again, just on the basis of a principle of loyal cooperation. I think it would have been good to have a look at that. It's just a question of follow-up to the reply we just got. Maybe there will be replies on what we've just received, and we simply haven't had time to read them. Now we saw that very interesting chart with all the links in the stages.
And this would lead me to believe that since there are all these different steps and all these different individuals, well, maybe something did go wrong. And as a result, well, maybe there are a few problems in the various bodies involved in this flowchart, as it were, which ranges from when the call for interest goes out to the assessment of the experts, the assessment of the projects, the allocation of the funds. If all these individuals don't realize that advocacy, strong advocacy, goes above and beyond the guidelines. Well, maybe people didn't want to disturb the people involved or maybe the work wasn't done carefully enough. But anyway, to go back to the disclaimer which our chair mentioned earlier.
Now at our meetings, we can't quote data that isn't published. And we have these confidentiality rules regarding the information received. So my office went in to look and study what was in the public domain, and there is quite a lot in the mechanisms which the commission allows for checks. There are three instruments, the financial transparency system, your EU portal. And then there's a third element, a third way of accessing data.
And consulting the information in these instruments online, it's possible to see that the work which is done to influence the institutions, to lobby the institutions, which is carried out by the NGOs, is available in reports published within these transparency instruments. And I'd like to mention two of them, because otherwise, we could have a lot of meetings like this. But if the assessment criteria are very diverse, we'll never be able to get to the end of this. Could I just mention one very obvious case, the environment of the European Environmental Bureau? Now it's a very important NGO.
It's an umbrella NGO. And it received more than €130,000,000 over five years for 38 different contracts with the commission or agencies in a number of areas. It received €700,000 from Sinea for a project amounting to about €6,000,000 in 2024 to provide policy support to the Green Deal projects. Now in the report, which you can find on the EU funding and tenders portal, Vice President Timmerman, he was Vice President at the time, thanked EB for having supported the work which was done on the Green Deal. But then if you have a look at the transparency register, and you look at the activities of the organization, you find meetings, virtually monthly meetings with Vice President Tindemans.
So it would appear to be that the relationship between the person who decides on policies, the person who is politically responsible for the agencies, who are the people who organize the call for tenders, and the beneficiaries of a vast amount of resources for those tenders, you can see that the relationship is very close indeed, closer than what it should be for people who are externs and who have a relationship with the institutions, experts from these NGOs. There's another point. What does Sineja think about this? What about this relationship? Do you not think that this was a form of political interference?
Do you not think that it went above and beyond the relationship which normally exists between the commission and agencies when it's a question of public funds? Now if there is this political influence and if there is risk, Commissioner Seraphin quite rightly pointed this out regarding projects at 2024, this organization, when thanking Tendermint, also refers to the support which this association or organization gave to the Ambient Air Quality Directive and to the revision of the work program of the commission with a view to increasing the changes to the REACH program. But do you think that there's not a risk in terms of the reputation of the institution? I think so. Now another institution, Fern, Sineer allocated a considerable amount of money to that within a project, which led to €7,500,000 being given to the NGO over the past five years.
Now there was a project which was put forward by Vern. Now I'm just going to quote and invert comments now. Now over the next three years, our 19-person team will be influencing more than three dozen policies which are fundamental for life priorities and in particular Natura, biodiversity, circular economy, quality of life, clean economy, and climate change. I'd like to understand whether Senir was aware of this project. Now if you're going to be influencing more than three dozen policies, isn't that violating the principle of cooperation as enshrined by our treaties?
And here, could I turn the question around? Since this is what these people were to do, if they took money to do that, how did you check that this was actually done? Now I think it's absurd to take money for this sort of reason. But since they did get that money, how do you check that the money was spent according to the specifications of the project? And then one last point, thank you for being so patient.
We know and Commissioner Seraphin, I believe, wrote this that ADEA, the executive agency for health and the digital area, had similar problems. And it asked to review CITIC contracts, which are believed to be problematic. Out of the 30, 15 were reviewed and changed in order to be in keeping with the May 2024 guidelines. Now from the previous meeting, apparently of the 28 problematic cases which were identified for SENEA, nothing was changed with regard to these contracts. So what happened?
Were you not able to convince the 28 contractors that it was necessary to amend the contracts? Or do these contractors believe that they are covered, politically speaking, by those they met once a month? It's rather hard to understand why an agency such as Woman managed to get 15 out of 30 contracts changed, and Sineia didn't manage to get any of them changed? Thank you.
Speaker 9
Mister Fidanza, you have covered quite a large number of different points. I would reply to the ones that are within the remit of CINEIA as I cannot reply to, you know, other contracts or grant agreements which have not been signed by us. You refer still to a complex system. I understand that, you know, there are many different steps. But as I said before, you know, the system of evaluation using experts and with the different steps is widely used by the commission.
The purpose of this is to have a robust, transparent, solid system where we are awarding the best proposals the funding from the European Union budget. Just using objective award criteria, which was adopted by the commission in the multi-annual work program. Some of the projects can be quite technical and therefore require, you know, a deeper knowledge that sometimes or most of the times, the staff of the commission or the staff of the agencies cannot cover in full. And that's why we are hiring experts. Experts, you know, as I said, they are independent.
They are coming in their own personal capacity. We have high requirements regarding their experience. We are also checking, you know, present connections, previous connections, in order to declare the absence of conflict of interest, but it's not universal. The conflict of interest, how it's been determining, is on a basis of different proposals. This is what it is about.
We take it very seriously, as I said, and, you know, there are mechanisms to avoid that. In any case, you know, we use not only one expert, but several experts to evaluate a proposal, so we get different opinions. And this is just the basis for the European Commission services. The European Commission Service together with the commission to form our opinion. So that's one point that you try to cover.
Speaker 9
On the contract of one of the NGOs that you have mentioned, well, I just can speak about life. I don't know what other contracts or grant agreements they have. It's not my responsibility, and it's not under my remit. No. All calls for proposals are public.
We welcome applicants from all over Europe at the associated countries to the program. We make widely publication of the different opportunities. We carry out info sessions. This is a very open and democratic program. And, therefore, you know, based on the solid evaluation system, we are giving the funds in an objective way to the best proposals that we have received.
You also mentioned the guidelines. I can come back to those. The issue was that the guidelines existed in 2024, but were made public to the entities in November 2024. And, therefore, when most of these grant agreements were already signed, they were about to be completed. These agreements, you know, and I think that already the commissioner before in other public appearances said they were not illegal.
There was nothing irregular, and therefore, we did not have any legal means on our side to modify them. The NGOs also claim legal expectations and also the right not to amend the grant agreements when the grant was about to finish. Otherwise, I would like to confirm that after the guidelines have been made public and in the call proposals, which was issued once the guidelines had been made public, the NGOs have fully collaborated, and the grant agreements have been signed, respecting the guidelines. We have recently had an audit from the internal audit service, which confirmed that both the commission and CINEEA have taken the necessary steps for having the grant agreements in line with the guidance issued. And I think that's all on my side.
Andreas Schwab
Thank you very much, Miss Abagarote. Next, the question is coming from Mister Demeter.
Csaba Dömötör
Thank you, chair. Let me speak Hungarian.
First of all, I'd like to make a general comment. And instead of limiting myself to one area, I'd like to look at things much more broadly, and look at the political situation in member states. In favor of liberal and leftist movements. In the last meeting, I found out that a lot of decisions involve experts from the commission, or rather experts to whom the commission delegates responsibilities, and we don't really know who takes the decisions. Who are these experts who decide on particular proposals?
Because the list is very long that you publish, and then we don't know which experts make which decisions. Here, we're talking about hundreds of millions of euros. So there is a great political importance there, and this is something that should be made public for each contract that is decided on. That's why I'd like to ask you if in the commission, would you be prepared not only to publish the list of all the experts, but to say which experts made the decisions for which contract, because that would be important. Would you personally be in favor of, for each project, for each contract, having the actual list of experts who made the decisions on that?
Thank you.
Monika Hohlmeier
So we changed meanwhile the chair, so welcome. Say hello to you. Mister Schwab had to go to the plenary, so I'm replacing him. I would like to give the floor to the commission or to senior Missus Avagarote. Yeah.
Avagarote.
Speaker 9
I would like to clarify that the experts do not make any decisions. The role of the evaluators is to assist the evaluation committee in their work. This is foreseen in the financial regulation. You know, the experts evaluate the proposals against the work criteria set in the call for proposals, and this assessment helps the evaluation committee, which is only composed of a staff of the European Commission, in making a recommendation to the responsible authorizing officer. So, no, the experts do not make a decision.
They do a preliminary assessment who helps us to take the final decision. In respect of the names and for the specific clothes works, Zinia cannot disclose, you know, this personal data to the public and not to the European Parliament. In general, the processing of personal data is governed by regulation 2018/1725 of 23 October 2018 on the protection of natural persons with regard to the processing of personal data by union institutions, bodies, offices, and agencies, and on the free movement of such data and the disclosure of such personal data to third parties. And therefore, this will be incompatible with the purpose limitation principle established by this regulation. Even if we don't publish the data to the public, and you are asking, well, give it to the European Parliament members, I would like to say that, unfortunately, also this disclosure of personal data will also go against the confidentiality arrangement foreseen in the framework agreement between the European Commission and the European Parliament.
The FRINGORA agreement on relations between the European Commission and the European Parliament established that before any transmission of documents, all personal data must be removed from the documents. And according to article three, personal data means any information of the regulation on data protection, means that personal data means any information related to an identity or identifiable natural person. An identifying natural person is one who can be identified directly or indirectly, in particular, by reference to name, identification number, location data, online identifier, and other factors. So if we were to transmit this information, we'll have to remove all this personal data, meaning that the transmission of any document related to it will become empty information. Also, the reason of the issue why, you know, we don't publish this information publicly, and I think that's important, is that when you publish names with certain relation, I'm saying publicly, to proposals or to topics or information close to it, we are running a risk as an independent body because we have potential risk.
The potential applicants try to influence the opinion of the experts, and that's why we will go into very dangerous waters. Thank you.
Monika Hohlmeier
Miss Carote, I give the floor at once to miss to the colleague, but may I intervene a little bit before? I was a former minister of a ministry that has more staff than the whole commission. So we had 107,000 people, and we had a lot of expert teams. And we are under the same GDPR as you are. But we are spending public money here, and we are here to discharge authority.
This means here is a need-to-know basis for us if the experts that you have nominated are qualified to do the job. This we cannot do if you just give us some names. That is John Muller, and I don't know where the man is coming from and what he has done. So, normally, when we were nominating in our ministry an expert, we clearly identified what expertise the person has and why the person was chosen. Then we try to find a good mixture of different expertise inside of an expert group to have different opinions, different points of view, different approaches, different organizations, but all of them with knowledge about the issue where they have to talk about.
And then, thirdly, we published them so that the public even knew who were the experts, because it's public money. It's taxpayers' money. And there is nobody to be protected because somebody could be damaged. They are experts to deliver an expertise on who is receiving millions of funds from the European taxpayers. So I don't understand at all, in front of a discharge authority, why you are not accepting?
If not, we have to go to court, to be frank. Because this is a new style of noninformation of the discharge authority, and you have an obligation to this. We have a need-to-know basis. We are not visitors to the commission. We are the discharge authority here.
And I have a little bit the impression that the respect is not the biggest one of the commission. And I don't hope that we have, in New York Times, always to go to the court of justice to get all kind of informations because this is not a very good basis on interactions between us. So sorry. But I just have to say it, because with all your nice words, this is a disrespect of the discharge authority hiding behind the GDPs that is not applying for this. Thank.
Csaba Dömötör
you. Well, I would suggest here that we all have to take ourselves seriously. No one here wants to know the personal data of these decision makers. We just want to know their names. We don't want to know their telephone numbers or where they live.
And I would also point out that in some of your answers, you made my data public, also with my address. That means my data protection hasn't been respected. That's an area where member states wouldn't say that they can't give this information because it's confidential, and that companies' and managers' names can't be published. That's something member states wouldn't accept. And the commission can't say that then for any country where there is the rule of law.
We would need to look at the list of experts. And when we have looked at what's been published so far, we've seen that there are some who are preferred, and they make the decisions and work in the same areas. And that's why we would then, I could also refer to specific examples. Then it's another reason why I would point out that we can't really have the documents just a few minutes before our meeting starts. We need to have all the names, but can I then conclude that the commission is not prepared to tell us the names of the experts?
Is that correct?
The floor back to Mrs. Carotte.
Speaker 9
We have published the names of all the experts per year of the call. This you can have. Is it public?
Monika Hohlmeier
Yes. But without any expertise. That's like if you write John Miller, this exists 500,000 times. So we have to identify then who is this, what we don't need the name of birth. We don't need the private address.
We don't need the telephone number. We don't need the private email. These are data that are protected. But the data is okay. This person has an expertise in energy because he has worked for five years at the university of whatever or was in an industrial company, working on this and this file or has produced a huge study on a certain so, but normally, we check the expertise of a group, and this is data that is not confidential.
We don't want to have the telephone number. We don't want to have the email address, the private one. We don't want to know how many children the person has. We don't want to know any personal data, sexual orientation, or private interests. We are just interested in the factual expertise data.
That's all what we wish to have.
Dirk Gotink
Dear. Thank you very much. Or did Miss Abegoerta want to reply to those last suggestions?
Speaker 9
I took note of the question, and I will check with the commission what can be given to you.
Dirk Gotink
Thank you very much. Well, you know, I think the no. I think it's I think it's not even a question whether this committee would need to have access to that kind of it's not a question because and we can we've heard it also last time, experts don't make decisions. No. But they prepare the decisions.
It's like, I mean, in my office, my assistants don't take decisions. I do. But they are basically preparing all the everything before I actually take that decision. So in that sense, and then they are online, by the way, who they are. So I did ask a question because you say, well, you have, like, 150 to 100 experts per year.
That means you've got quite a database of thousands of names. Do you have a negative list of experts with whom you have bad experiences, conflicts of interest, anything? A blacklist of experts that you have refused. I asked you the first day, the first round, the question, have you ever refused an expert on the basis of a conflict of interest?
Missus Carrotti.
Speaker 9
Yes, we do. We have, for every call, a register of all the conflict of interest that have been detected or identified and the measures that have been taken.
Csaba Dömötör
you. Well, sorry for taking the floor for the third time on this, but I would like to have an answer. Have I understood correctly that the commission is not prepared to publish information about the experts who have taken part specifically in each proposal, so that you would like to then agree among yourselves who's going to answer that question. Maybe we need a technical break, then, because this is a very important question.
Would yes, say.
please.
Speaker 19
Yes. Thank you very much. First of all, apologies for not being there today, because you know that I tried to be as much as possible in the room with you, but today was not possible. So, apologies for that. On your question, we understand the need that you have.
Speaker 20
Of course, when the different services accept or reject an expert, they, of course, have a CV. So we need to see if that CV, of course, we could blacken out and redact, as you said, Miss Hormeyer, the date of birth, the telephone, the email. So that wouldn't be a problem.
We don't need it.
Speaker 19
What we need to see with the legal service is, first of all, if we need to have the consent of those experts, and therefore, to have to ask, request, etcetera. So if you allow us, we will come back to you with a formal reply, but we do understand why you are asking for it and what is behind. And then if you can accept the CVs, that will ease our work, I think. And, also, if you could maybe tell us the scope a little bit more if you want all or specific or priority like you did with some requests, but we will come to you as soon as possible on that if you allow us. Thank you so much.
Monika Hohlmeier
May I, myself first intervene? We don't expect to have a whole CV. We want to know the expertise, and the names and the organizations they worked for. This is a need-to-know basis for a discharge authority. So, this is very clear in the inter-institutional relations.
So, I'm very astonished that this seems to be a problem for the commission, because we are not even talking about publishing. I would even publish them because even this is normally not a problem if you have an expert team. But what Dirk said is very important, and was Mr. Demeter, is to know who was in which expert group and for which network or for which grants they were experts. So this then gives the discharge authority the possibility and the reporters the possibility to check how if you have chosen it in a qualified way or if there are gaps or problems or whatever. At the moment, you prohibit us from doing our job, and this could constitute a bigger problem between the parliament and the commission.
So I give the floor to the Dear Kotting, our first corrector.
Dirk Gotink
Thank you. Thank you, chair. Last question on the experts, and then I think we've made the rounds. I don't know if anyone else still has questions, but then we can move on. I think in one of the last meetings, we also talked about CNEA in order to attract experts.
They also use third parties to organize the experts. And that we did not have access to those lists of names exactly because of the GDPR and that this then commercial entity would not grant CNEA the liberty to share that with us. Can you confirm that you use external parties to organize experts? And has there been a reflection started now on your side of whether this is actually an ideal situation in relation to what we are talking about here?
Miss Havakarote.
Speaker 9
Yes. Thank you. Well, I agree that maybe it was unfortunate that your reply didn't get to you before. It was not in my hands. But the situation has changed in the meantime, but I would like to clarify.
We are using a framework contractor who issues a public call for expression of interest, where we also make publicity on our website. So we make a wide publicity of opportunities for experts to enroll. And we discussed with the company. So these people do not work for this company. Yeah?
They also, this is a middle person who signs the expert contract with the individual people. We have worked a lot on that, and we have received the consent to make their names public, with the exception of three, if I recall correctly. Two, we were not able to reach them. They have worked already almost three years ago. And then one person, one expert did not want to have his or her name public.
Otherwise, all the names are now public since, I think, one week ago at least. It took us quite some time to get the agreement of everybody, but I think we are now there, so you can also access in the public and tender portal the list of all the names of the experts, whether they have been contracted through the framework contractor or they have been directly contracted by Cinea.
Csaba Dömötör
Last word of the collectometer. Just a short remark. We would not like to focus only on one group of experts or one contract. We would like to see them all public. Why am I saying this?
We have a list of a number of experts, on the website, contracted experts. The number is 16,000, almost 17,000. This is the number that we have. And we don't know which experts make decisions regarding which contracts, and that's a problem. So we are not curious regarding one contract.
We would like to make them all public. As far as we understand, the commission is not willing to make them public. Thank you.
Yes. Please, Teokotín.
Dirk Gotink
And now we refer to the letter and also to the external contractor seems to be an American company who organizes the experts, so in this case, for the commission, based on a call. And, I mean, we don't have time now to get into that, but it is something that we need to note and that I think we need to follow-up on. Let's move on the agenda.
Monika Hohlmeier
Yes. So perhaps a last answer, or if you would like to answer on, perhaps, or give us information after this meeting, how many contractors, contracted experts do you have, really. And because I don't want to have figures that are not clarified, I think clarified figures would be a good thing. So it's about it's up to the commission to explain to us how many contractors in which area exist. And the second issue of the Gothenk about an American company choosing the making of the preselection.
Could you perhaps explain to us why an American company was chosen for European programs?
Speaker 9
In the case of Life, the contractor, if I'm not wrong, is Canadian. Is it U? S? It's from the U. So, but we are contracting with the European company based in Brussels.
We are just following the public procurement in the financial regulation, so that's possible.
Monika Hohlmeier
So we wait for the answers, and I think we continue with okay. Jack, would you like to ask the other colleagues on other topics? Yes, please.
Dirk Gotink
Well, I had some questions for missus Sands, Redarro, if that's possible. Yeah? We just, please. Okay. Then we just move on, like that.
Well, thanks, of course. Again, I already said that for being here. Again, you're excused for being in Brussels and not here, for once. I have a question. Again, on the letter, we looked at an interesting annex 3.
And I think it's page 13. Maybe that's interesting to go to. And it describes the criteria which are used for evaluating proposals for framework partnership agreements. So this is the basis on which then I believe experts, they look at it and they use this, but maybe you can correct me. They use these different points.
So, point one, relevance. Point two, support to EU policy development, which includes sentences like extent to which the applicant supports the integration of environmental, climate and or energy policies, extent to which the applicant will act as a channel with civil society in the area of environment, somehow implying that it somehow needs like a reinforcing effect or like an amplifier effect for the work that will be done. The third point is support to the EU policy implementation. Again, channel to civil society, extent to which the applicant uses its network to identify obstacles to policy implementation, appropriateness of quality, and the proposed measure. Well, a lot of things.
So I suppose that these are then and you can get points for the strength in these different criteria, if I understand this correctly. Yeah? I believe with the new guidelines, we have definitely taken a step forward in sort of clarifying the rules of engagement, basically, between institutions. Much needed. Do you believe that if we hold on to these, if these are the current selection criteria, evaluation criteria for framework partnership agreements, do you think that these are still in line also with the guidelines, would you say?
And I'm not here to do gotcha gotcha questions or anything. I'm just trying to work through the process. This is clearly focused at having commission policy and plans, putting them into contracts, and getting an amplification of the message and of the program in civil society, and we know what that means here in Brussels and in Strasbourg. It means basically policy influence. You're not in Brussels for classical civil society sort of reasons.
You're here to either get money or to influence policy. That's what you do in Brussels. A lot of good work by civil society is done out there in our cities and on our streets. But in Brussels, it is very clear what this means. Do you believe that we would need to review also these criteria for these framework partnership agreements?
Speaker 19
Thank you. Thank you very much for the question. This Annex III provides, as you said, the criteria, and then you have the points that are quite there is a range between zero and twenty. And then you can do weighting also depending on the importance of one area or another. And when you look at the different criteria that are being defined, it is in line with the Life Regulation.
And one of the objectives is that we need to ensure a vibrant society. So I don't think it needs to be revised. And with this, as I said, I think it is fully in line with the life regulation. Thank you.
Yes. Exactly. That's it.
and then.
Dirk Gotink
We are short, so take it again. We go in circles about the life regulation. But still then, the question is on the table, and that's what we're trying to uncover or to disprove, let's say, that the commission is, let's say, not using contracts to amplify their political agenda and to lobby the commission itself. So other DGs, but also the European Parliament. And if I look at these criteria, then simply it's just there.
It's just written down. And it's very much in line with the life regulation, and that was also very much the intention of the life regulation, apparently. But I think in a way, it undermines also the life regulation because there is also stuff that is being done that is very valuable and important. But this undermines the whole thing. The fact that some colleagues that pretend to defend life very much are not here to openly discuss about these issues is a problem in my view.
Because if we don't acknowledge it, then this, then I think there are very fundamental issues in general with the life regulation, and we need to be much more specific, much more precise. I know that the DG budget was also very much probably surprised about what they found a couple of years ago in all these contracts. Do you believe now that the guidelines, when it comes to CNEA, for example, do you believe that these new guidelines are getting the results that you expected from them? Have you done follow ups on what is happening with new contracts? What do you see change in the language?
Or do we need to continue requesting all these contracts, because they're not published yet, which we would love to have simply on a systemic basis? But do you believe that you've seen improvement here also when we talk about CINEEA?
Monika Hohlmeier
Miss, so who is answering? Commission DG Patch, Miss Sanfred Rado, Miss Carlos?
We can't hear you.
Monika Hohlmeier
Oh, we lost the sound again. I hope that our technician solved the problem.
I have breath.
Now, fine. Okay.
Speaker 19
Can you hear me? Yes. Perfect. No. Thank you.
So I was just saying that the commission and all the services have been given a lot of attention to all the content of the guidelines. We have repeatedly said it in all the fora within the commission, being the group of director of resources in the corporate management board. We have issued the guidelines. We have done reminders. We have trained some new, senior managers also on the rules and the points of attention.
We have been, we have been also answering quite a lot of questions from the services when they have questions about how to interpret certain points of the guidelines. The internal audit service did an audit on CINEA, and they found that there was a good control and application of the guidelines. So I guess, in the future, there might be additional audits or internal controls. But so far, what we have seen is that everyone knows the guidelines, and everyone takes a lot of care. And you saw also that when you ask, and now we are not talking of senior, but in general, about the commission.
When you ask for additional grant agreements or contracts, some services also identify additional pieces where they say, well, maybe we overlook. So I think that this year, with all the additional controls and assessment of all the contracts and grant agreements, it has been taking it very seriously. I think Paloma wants to complement on the point more on CINEEA, but from the commission, I can reassure you that it is on top of everyone's head.
Speaker 9
Yes. I would like to contribute to the reply of this question on what CINEEA has been doing since the guidance took place. So what we have done is, first, we have a reference and a link in the form from the corporate guidance into the live program call for proposals template, and therefore, it has been replicated in all our published call for proposals. We have also organized information sessions that we do for potential applicants where we have had a specific part dedicated to explain what the guidance is about and draw their attention to the potential applicants to the need of full alignment of their proposals with the requirements of the guidance. We have also trained external experts, but also our own staff, on the need to perform, you know, screening of the proposals' alignment with the guidance.
And then also, evaluation committee in the last committee we have had have been presented with the screening of the grant agreements, particularly on that, and they have discussed, you know, whether they were or they were not in line with the guidance. Otherwise, if we found some instance where we still thought that this could create a reputational risk, you know, we have come back to those successful applicants and ask them to, you know, modify the parts in order to make sure that their activities will be in line with the guidance. And, yeah, I think that would be these are the main elements that will give me reasonable assurance that the grant agreements, which have been signed after the publication of the sign of the guidance, are in line with it.
Thank.
Carlo Fidanza
you. Allow me to go back to December 2024 when commissioner Serafin, in the statement we're too familiar with, declared quite clearly that contracts where there was a request to carry out detailed actions for European institutions and their representatives and that there was, he did refer to the fact that there was a reputational risk. Now could I just use that as a basis? Now we weren't sufficiently satisfied with the rather evasive replies which we received. Now the lobbying activity nearly became a legal obligation, and that was part of the contracts.
And there was a reputational risk. And Commissioner Seraphin mentioned this reputational risk. Now what did you check? Did you see, did you check that the firms in question did carry out the appropriate lobbying activities with the coal legislators? Who should have checked if this was not checked?
Are the documents which were drafted following these checks? And if so, could they please be shared with this committee? Could they be made public so as to inspect the activity carried out? And then there's another point after the guidelines of 2024. Now if there was an agreement which was signed and paid and contained a targeted advocacy activity which was not legitimate, this should imply that there was a lack of control on the part of the DG concerned.
And this, too, should have an impact on the annual statement regarding the reliability of that administration. Did this happen? Did you find payments concerning activities which should not have been carried out? And if you found these payments, how were they classified? Were they considered errors, noncompliant expenditures?
Were they mentioned in the annual reports? And then looking at what happened, the checks carried out by DG Budge, what about these checks? Were they based on the reports of other investigations carried out by the other authorities concerned, or were they carried out directly by DG Budge? And then looking forward now, going forward, does DG Budge intend to propose horizontal changes, which would apply across the board to all DGs to contract models or bases, so as to ensure that targeted lobbying and advocacy activities would be excluded from funding. Because not only do we have to identify what did not work, we also have to identify what should be done for the future so that things will work better, because the ideas for improvement in the guidelines might be bogged down if we don't have the appropriate technical instruments to make sure that they're implemented.
And at the moment, I don't think that we can do that. We have guidelines which are taking stock of the situation, but we have no tangible measures being suggested to avoid this sort of situation from occurring again in the next programs.
Speaker 19
Thank you very much. There's been a lot of questions. I will answer on the one specific for DigiBudget on the question that are we going to make horizontal changes. So we have already included a novelty which is that there is in the contracts an obligation to respect the guidance. But let me be clear also that we have programs that, and that was also one of the points that was reminded in the last scrutiny working group with Home and Just, that they foreseen advocacy activities in the legal basis.
Therefore, if you have a program that foresees advocacy, you cannot exclude advocacy from those grant agreements. Therefore, we will make sure that we apply the programs as they are being adopted by the co-legislators. And, but we will make sure that the guidelines apply from beginning to end by everyone. And otherwise, they will be excluded. Thank you.
Monika Hohlmeier
May I say that there were many more questions than this one only? Listen, see here that members have a lot of questions and commission and senior are always answering one out of 10. And on the wording of advocacy, I would recommend that advocacy not explicitly say that there should be a distinction if I read the new guidelines to intervening in legislative procedures or even writing amendments and so on. So advocacy can mean having the intention to promote good climate policy, to give new incentives, whatever. But the colleagues are now asking for the fourth time about these lobby activities and how they are really excluded, and if there are still things to be changed.
So I would recommend perhaps really to give their clear answers to the colleagues and to all the other questions, because if not, it doesn't make sense to be here. Then we have to think about it how we do this, because if there are questions and steadily no answers, that's a little bit problematic.
Speaker 9
Me to speak, please? I can complement on what Beatrizan was saying. The commission guidelines do not restrict the work of these organizations, but provide clarity on the type of activities that the European Union should not require as a condition of funding. I think that they cautioned that funding agreements requiring beneficiaries to undertake specifically the activities directed at the EU institutions or some of their representatives may entail a reputational risk, and therefore should not be made a conditional financing. I would like to say that CINE has never made a condition for financing for the NGOs to take such activities.
You know, the work programs were presented by the NGOs in that manner, it is themselves who decide with their own board members, and we just take stock. What I think the, I mean, the commissioner at the same time said in the European Parliament is that if they had been perceived as such, they create a reputational risk. At the same time, he said that those activities did not break any legal framework, and therefore, we did not have any right to stop payments, suspend the payment, cancel the grant agreement, and that's why this has not been done. What we are now doing, once the guidelines have been made public, is to make sure that the next grant agreements are written in a way that there is no misinterpretation.
Monika Hohlmeier
I'd like to come back to Mr. Ferdanza's question. He had a very specific question. And earlier, the commission told us that activities were carried out, which were definitely inadequate, as it was put, which then doesn't comply with the legal framework for the European Union. Perhaps I can give you a specific example. In a work package, which was then the basis for an expert evaluation, it said how many amendments for MEPs, reporters, shadow reporters should be provided.
And there were then success quotas or rates that were mentioned. That is not then in line with a democratic process under the rule of law, and to be used then as part of the legislative process. The logical consequence to that is that have you found that some of this money shouldn't have been spent on those activities, was a certain proportion of the money then questioned as to whether it was properly used, was a certain amount, then were there demands for that to be returned? Do you have any kind of scale here that you can give us in terms of the order of magnitude? Because so far, we haven't had very clear answers from the Commission.
Another example springs to mind where there was a contract where it said that they had to promote local protest activities. This was something where people were taken to court in Germany because they were extremely violent, and it even led to arrests and convictions. Some people were given then lengthy prison sentences. This wasn't, though, an isolated case. So can I refer then to Mr.?
Fidance's question and say, have you then considered this? And has that thinking then made you look again at those work packages? Did you see then that there were serious errors where you saw that they were inadequate and not in line with the European legislation? Then from your analysis, has there been anything else apart from reputational damage? Because from our point of view, there does seem to have been.
Does that then apply to other contracts where there have been calls for proposals, not just for the Parliament, but also for Council working groups where there were specific addresses given? There were working groups which were targeted by lobbies. We've heard about the nature restoration law. This came from the platform of the European Commission where certain MEPs were mentioned by a commission official and that they should be persuaded to change their opinion, and they were then put under pressure to vote another way. This is really scandalous examples, but I have the feeling that here you're underplaying all of this by just saying reputational risk.
We would actually just say that these were serious errors, then mismanagement, abuse of the system. Have there been any consequences from all of this, as there normally would be? I don't think that we have had clear answers to my colleagues' questions. Thank you.
Speaker 19
Thank you. All I can say at this stage, and we can come back to you, is that, if we could not if those contracts were legal, we could not just stop them. That's the way we already answered that. Now what we have to do is to go back and see with the authorizing officers what was the follow-up given to those activities, were they carried out or not. And then not, how was the disbursement made?
Or but at the moment, I will like you to if you if it's possible to send us those references, and then I can come back to you and discuss with the relevant DGs or agencies.
Monika Hohlmeier
Perhaps I can just pick up on something you said there. You can have legal contracts, but within legal contracts, there can also be mistakes in terms of implementation, and also how the whole system is put in place. So I don't think you really answered my question, and it is something we need to be answered.
Dirk Gotink
I think you're right that the issue of output is a very significant one, because we have clearly some goals and every there's scaling systems and pointing system and waiting systems, and it's all super objective. That's what we hear until the work is done and the contract is done. And then God knows what happened with it or how then it is evaluated. So actually, and considering that these contracts are also selected based on EU added value, then my question would be a posteriori, okay, what was the added value? But just to for me to clarify, but I think we can also pick this up the issue of outputs in another meeting of this working group.
Basically, what I hear the commission say and DG Budge say, okay. Please explain if I'm confused. So we're telling the beneficiaries, don't write it down anymore, but you can still do it. Or are you telling the beneficiaries, don't write it down, and don't do it? There's a huge difference.
So there's two choices because it is legal. That's what you say. You and I think many of us, if we look at the regulation, we would say, unfortunately, is. So, is it the first option? Don't write it down, but it's okay if you do it because it's legal, or don't write it down and don't do it.
I give the floor to the commission and senior.
Speaker 19
Thank you. So it is, obviously, the answer to don't write it down and don't do it. And if they do it and if we identify that they do it, then they can cancel the contract. I think it has to be very clear that now one of the prerequisites to receive funding is to comply with the guidelines. So that's clear.
Now we are not the only ones also funding those companies, NGOs, etcetera. So what we can do is to follow what they do under the programs that we are financing. Okay? But it is clear that if we have a guideline, it's very clear what they can do and what they cannot do. And now we have said this is compulsory.
It's not just something to think and to reflect and to try to align. No. It is a prerequisite for getting finances from the commission. Thank you.
would be
Monika Hohlmeier
You could really refer to precise answers on the questions that were put by the colleagues, because some of the answers are very vague. And meanwhile, we need some clear answers. So it would be very fine, and I would be very grateful if you could deliver it. And explicitly, again, we had this issue about the work packages and the payments. So, what are you doing if payments are done in a way that you would say that this is an error?
This is not in line with the prerequisites of guidelines, even in the former cases, because I think the wording reputational damage is a nice wording to circumvent possible problems to name real errors. So perhaps we could, there, identify a little bit more technically how this is foreseen for the future. Would the colleagues have questions to give to the commission? Because we are at the end of our meeting. Dirk, then no further questions.
So, thank you very much to commission and to missus Ritterado and to missus Avagarote. And, colleague in finance.
Carlo Fidanza
So we are deciding to postpone the hearing of madam Parenti, but from the transparency register to the next time we can invite her again if she's available. It would be very interesting to listen also to her the aspects of the register.
Monika Hohlmeier
Would you expect that she perhaps explains today, or would you prefer to postpone it? Because we have five minutes now.
Register, because I think it's
Yeah.
Monika Hohlmeier
Okay. Alright then. But everybody agrees with it. So I'm sorry, I apologize that there were so many questions about the other things, but perhaps we could do it next time for the transparency register. Is this okay?
Of April.
Next meeting. April 29.
Monika Hohlmeier
Would be the next meeting. To be confirmed. To be confirmed. Thanks a lot. Okay.
Then may I give a warm thank to the commission, to Tenea, and to all colleagues, and we see you soon. Thank you.
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