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BRUSSELS — In the fallout from the cash-for-influence Qatargate scandal, the European Parliament pushed for the creation of a common ethics body to set and monitor standards for elected officials.
Now, that plan could be on the rocks.
Centrist and left-wing MEPs fear the Parliament’s right-wing majority could obstruct — or even block — its implementation, despite an inter-institutional agreement last term to create the body.
Right-wing lawmakers have teamed up to reopen previously settled files, such as legislation on the Green Deal, as well as to push for harsher rhetoric on migration and against the Nicolás Maduro regime in Venezuela.
Last term’s ethics body negotiations saw much back-and-forth between centrist and left-wing forces, which supported the body, and the center-right European People’s Party, which pushed back against the idea that such a body could arbitrarily define moral conduct. The EPP also warned it would become a disciplinary chamber for MEPs.
At the time, centrist and left-wing groups squeezed the bill through by a thin margin.
But fast-forward a year and the balance of power in the Parliament has changed: The EPP has the upper hand along with the so-called Venezuela majority of right-wing groups.
During a “very heated” meeting three weeks ago, according to three MEPs who were present, the Socialists and Democrats, Renew and the Greens pushed to send a list of nominees for the body’s expert group to Parliament President Roberta Metsola and the vice-president in charge of the ethics body.
Their goal was to accelerate the implementation of the ethics body with those first appointments.
But far-right and right-wing MEPs opposed it, using a procedural maneuver to slow things down: The Patriots for Europe, European Conservatives and Reformists and EPP argued that before the Parliament can officially engage with the body, the house’s own rules of procedure need to be amended.
The Greens’ Daniel Freund, the lead negotiator on the creation of the ethics body last term, said “it’s not true” that the Parliament needs to tweak its internal rules to engage with the body, adding that the EPP “tried to weaken it or outright prevent it in the past.”
Some lawmakers also fear that Sven Simon, who led the EPP’s charge against the body during the last mandate and is now the chair of the Constitutional Affairs Committee, may be seeking to bring it down altogether.
MEP Juan Fernando López Aguilar, S&D’s lead in the committee, said Simon could “take advantage” of his position as chair “to obstruct the fulfillment” of the EU ethics body agreement.
“The most worrying thing is that, in an uninhibited way, the EPP has arranged an opposing majority [to S&D, Renew and Greens] with the three far-right groups … to object or postpone the implementation of the agreement,” he said.
But talking to POLITICO in his office, Simon said that as chair he will be “neutral and objective” during the process, insisting clarification is needed on who nominates the body’s advisory experts.
When the Constitutional Affairs Committee reaches an agreement, the rules of procedure will need to be ratified by the plenary, where they risk being brought down by the Venezuela majority.
