Do rapporteurs receive independent expert policy advice? Indirect lobbying via the European Parliament's committee secretariat

Abstract

Rapporteurs rely on secretariat officials to provide policy information that is independent from vested interests. They require this information to be provided quickly, so that lobbyists' policy claims can be verified ahead of the completion of the draft report. However, it turns out that officials' accumulation of specific policy expertise is endogenous to the lobbying process. Secretariat officials are generalists lacking the detailed policy information that they are called upon to supply. Entrenched interests including the Commission fill the void by providing officials with policy information and on occasion even loan them their experienced staff, thereby indirectly lobbying the rapporteurs. This activity directly affects the content of European Union legislation, as the information that rapporteurs receive and act upon is less independent than might have been expected. These ideas are analysed with the aid of over 150 structured interviews with policy actors, and with the aid of the results of an EP internal questionnaire.

Keywords:

• Committee secretariat
• European Parliament
• lobbying strategy
• rapporteur

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am very grateful for the highly constructive criticism provided by Andreas Dür, Simon Hix, Markus Wagner and Arndt Wonka, along with two anonymous referees. I am also indebted to the many practitioners and politicians who gave up their time to be interviewed, some more than once.

Notes

To illustrate this, the insertion of the words ‘if adopted all others fall’ against one of several amendments on a particular issue ensures that, if a majority is reached for the ‘chosen’ amendment, the remainder will not be put to the vote.

To establish whether political affiliation plays a part in the selection of committee administrators, two direct questions were asked of 39 secretariat officials. Over a quarter of respondents (10/39) agreed that their ‘appointment (was) influenced by party affiliation’ and almost one-half (18/39) confirmed that ‘party affiliation plays a significant role in the recruitment of secretariat staff’.

The criteria for a lobbyist's inclusion in the sample was identification by at least two actors from different sections of a policy community (average 3.01), i.e. by an MEP, secretariat official or an already established active lobbyist.

When the question was posed to the interviewees, they were asked to answer in the capacity of rapporteur. This may account for the relatively high score which were awarded to secretariat officials.

The results show that the Internet is an important source of information, but the category is not sufficiently nuanced to warrant more consideration.

‘Independent expertise’ was qualified by the term ‘relatively’, as, prior to this, interviewees invariably stated that no information source is independent.

Secretariat officials were asked ‘is it common that the way in which you choose to order the voting lists affects the outcome of the final report?’ Five administrators declined to answer.

It became clear that secretariat administrators are often present when rapporteurs are lobbied.

Respondents often gave a range, for example 20-25. In these instances, the median was taken.