Germany’s Council Presi­dency: Between the Public Inte­rest and Lobbyism

A new report from Lobby­Con­trol reveals a lack of conspi­racy in the Euro­pean Council. The authors of the study fear that during the German EU Presi­dency, indi­vi­dual corpo­rate inte­rests could become the focus of atten­tion. Germany must be careful not to let itself be influenced by economic actors during its Council Presi­dency.

In June, the Brussels-based NGO Corpo­rate Europe Obser­va­tory (CEO) and Lobby­Con­trol e.V. published a report titled ​„The German EU Council Presi­dency: Industry in the Lead Role?“. In it, the authors show the influence that German industry and lobbyism has on decis­ions made by the German govern­ment.

Germany will take over the role of the Euro­pean Council Presi­dency at a special time. It will be marked by the climate crisis, Brexit, and the corona crisis. Lobbying influences will play a parti­cu­larly important role in dealing with the Corona pandemic. The next few months will show which sectors benefit for which reasons, espe­ci­ally in the distri­bu­tion of EU-wide corona aid.

Case studies show the influence of economic actors

Nina Katz­e­mich works as an EU campai­gner at Lobby­Con­trol. ​„We stand up for trans­pa­rency and equal access, which simply does not exist at the moment“, she says. In a cross-party open letter deli­vered in mid-June, the Corpo­rate Europe Obser­va­tory and Lobby­Con­trol came toge­ther with almost 100 members of the Euro­pean Parlia­ment. These members already called on Chan­cellor Angela Merkel to make trans­pa­rency a central concern during the German Presi­dency. The idea for LobbyControl’s recent report arose when the orga­niza­tion noticed how indi­vi­dual member states impeded one another’s EU decision-making, evidently because they repre­sented the inte­rests of their coun­try’s corpo­rate lobby. In the report, six case studies by various orga­niza­tions demons­trate how the German govern­ment has blocked EU projects in the past in favor of German corpo­rate inte­rests.

For example, a BUND study shows the rela­ti­onship between the federal govern­ment and the auto­mo­tive industry, and points out how Germany tried in the past to keep CO2 emis­sion limits as low as possible in order to support the German car industry. A study by German Envi­ron­mental Aid (Deut­sche Umwelt­hilfe) reveals non-trans­pa­rent talks between the Federal Ministry of Econo­mics and Energy and the gas industry, the former of which planned to use gas as a fossil energy source for energy tran­si­tion. A further case study by Network Tax Justice (Netz­werk Steu­er­ge­rech­tig­keit) shows how Germany has blocked decis­ions on tax trans­pa­rency in the EU to protect German compa­nies who evade taxes by lever­aging opera­tions in low-tax count­ries.

Industry asso­cia­tions do not dictate opinions

Lobby­Con­trol now fears that industry influences could have an impact on the Euro­pean Council Presi­dency, and poten­ti­ally sway important decision-making processes, such as the Euro­pean Green Deal. The Green Deal’s initia­tive is to reduce net emis­sions of green­house gases to zero, and make Europe a climate-neutral conti­nent by 2050.

Dr. Silke Karcher is the Head of Divi­sion in the Federal Ministry of the Envi­ron­ment on Euro­pean climate and energy policy. ​„We have these industry asso­cia­tions and their role is to stand up for their members“, says the engi­neer. ​„Indus­tries and NGOs are influ­en­tial lobby­ists, but only serve as a guide to poli­ti­cians“, says Dr. Karcher. ​„The indus­trial orga­niza­tions contri­bute to the coun­try’s prospe­rity. Poli­ti­cians listen to them, but hopefully only to reflect and come to the right decis­ions,“ she explains.

For her, the decision of the Federal Govern­ment to pay a premium price for buying elec­tric cars in order to boost consump­tion in the after­math of the pandemic is one example of how the Federal Govern­ment does not listen exclu­si­vely to the inte­rests of the car lobby. The car industry had demanded a similar premium for new cars powered by fossil fuels. ​„The package for the economic upturn that has been adopted in Germany proves that at least here it is not true,“ declares Karcher.

Katz­e­mich was surprised by this decision, but for her, this was not illus­tra­tive of the fact that the Federal Govern­ment is not influenced by the auto­mo­tive industry. ​„We see this with plea­sure and as an achie­ve­ment of civil society that has put pres­sure and in the end was unders­tood by the poli­ti­cians,“ says Katz­e­mich.

Intrans­pa­rency of the Euro­pean Council

A major problem for Lobby­Con­trol is the non-trans­pa­rent way in which the Euro­pean Council works. They demand a lobby register – speci­fi­cally, that meetings of minis­ters with lobby­ists should be published. Accor­ding to Lobby­Con­trol, around 25,000 lobby­ists with an annual budget of 1.5 billion euros directly and indi­rectly influence EU gover­ning insti­tu­tions.

Not ever­y­thing is black and white, of course, and compa­nies do create important jobs. ​„But they have powerful argu­ments that do not fit in with the common good“, explains Katz­e­mich. The work of the EU Commis­sion and EU Parlia­ment has become more trans­pa­rent in recent years, but large, corpo­rate inte­rest groups still main­tain greater influence over the Council, and that influence is largely unob­served by civil society.

Dr. Susanne Hegels is Head of Unit for the German EU Council Presi­dency at the Federal Ministry of Econo­mics and Energy. She considers the fears of Lobby­Con­trol to be exag­ge­rated, but sees the need for more trans­pa­rency at the Euro­pean level. ​„We talk to repre­sen­ta­tives from the industry and listen to what they want. But that does not mean that we do exactly what they want and are not able to think what is right and what is in the general inte­rest at the same time“, explains Hegels.

„The truth is that Germany does not have a very strong lobby register“, she adds. There is already a provi­sion that a common trans­pa­rency register of the Euro­pean Union should be intro­duced volun­t­a­rily. Curr­ently, it is failing due to several legal problems. However, as of January, the perma­nent repre­sen­ta­tion of Germany in Brussels publishes all meetings of their ambassa­dors.

Under public obser­va­tion

Even if Germany has been guided by lobbying inte­rests in the past, this does not neces­s­a­rily mean that nothing will change during this Council Presi­dency. Germany could seize the oppor­tu­nity to set a good example. Above all, Katz­e­mich wants to bring the work of the Euro­pean Council and its func­tio­ning closer to the citi­zens: ​„We want the public to take a closer look so that the Federal Govern­ment is now more closely scru­ti­nized in its hand­ling of the climate crisis and the distri­bu­tion of the Federal Govern­ment’s funds.“