Changes from report parliamentary committee draft to plenary report

Added13. Underlines that Qatargate shed a new light on lobbying and policymaking in the EU; acknowledges the Ombudsman’s critical assessment of the scandal and welcomes the development of new measures designed at improving the integrity standards within the European Parliament to safeguard EU democracy; considers these actions as an important first step to enhance the EU regulatory framework, as they aim to foster higher ethics and anti-corruption standards and thereby make the EU institutions examples of integrity and accountability;

Added14. Welcomes the continuous efforts of the Ombudsman to improve lobbying transparency and ethics, in particular by requiring the Commission to strengthen the Code of Conduct for Commissioners, create a public record of meetings between Commissioners and lobbyists and proactively publish Commissioners’ travel expenses;

Added15. Underlines that the participation of citizens in EU decision-making is important for its legitimacy; appreciates the Ombudsman’s commitment to foster accountability in EU decision-making, especially in the area of environmental decisions; welcomes and supports the Ombudsman’s requests to the European Investment Bank (EIB) to take several transparency steps to enable the public to more easily see the potential environmental impact of the projects it finances, as well as the Ombudsman’s intention to step up her scrutiny of the EIB's activities, in the light of the EIB's insufficient follow-up to date, in particular regarding the timely publishing of information about projects related to the environment and EIB finances in order to give sufficient time to the public to raise concerns;

Added16. Commends the Ombudsman’s work in prioritising her assessment of the transparency of EU environmental decision-making, following, inter alia, her finding of maladministration in the Commission’s failure to consider properly the environmental impact of the EU-Mercosur trade agreement before concluding negotiation, the Commission’s severe shortcomings in handling requests on public access to environmental information and the lack of clear rules to ensure that experts the Commission consults, in the context of environmental policymaking, are not subject to conflicts of interest;

Added17. Underlines that the Ombudsman found regrettable the fact that proactive transparency mainly happened only after the national plans under the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) had already been approved, thus preventing the public from adequately following the negotiations; is concerned about the lengthy delays that the Commission has been incurring in dealing with requests for public access to RRF-related documents, in some cases taking one year or more; urges the Commission to encourage the Member States to use a public portal to list all recipients of funding under the RRF, to continue publishing its preliminary assessments of Member States’ payment requests and to inform the public with concrete details about its supervisory and audit work in order to ensure meaningful accountability for all funds spent, welcomes the publication by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, in collaboration with the European Ombudsman’s Office, of the policy paper entitled ‘Towards good practice principles for government transparency in the use of recovery funds’, which provides guidance to governments on ensuring transparency and accountability in the use of COVID-19 recovery funds, welcomes, in this regard, the Ombudsman’s efforts to improve the transparency standards related to the RRF;

Added18. Highlights that in her strategic initiative concerning how the Commission ensured transparency and balanced interest representation under the common agricultural policy (CAP), the Ombudsman found that key elements of the CAP national strategic plans, including specific measures on budget items and milestones to be fulfilled, were missing, thus making it difficult for citizens and interested parties to understand the conditions under which Member States could use the assistance provided by the new CAP; supports the Ombudsman’s call on the Commission to proactively disclose more information concerning the approval of Member States’ strategic plans under the CAP; asks the Commissioner for Agriculture and his cabinet, as well as the Commission’s Directorate-General for Agriculture and Rural Development, to comply with the Ombudsman’s recommendations and seek a fair and balanced representation of the interests of both farmers and civil society in its meetings and exchanges with interest representatives, given that, as pointed out by the Ombudsman in her letter of February 2022, the Commissioner for Agriculture and his cabinet held more meetings with industry representatives than with environmental organisations and other organisations like research institutions; requests that the Commission assume an active role in securing compliance with the transparency obligations imposed on the Member States, including the obligation to disclose the broader entities that beneficiaries of funds belong to and the obligation to publish the total amount of payments received by a beneficiary, with a view to guaranteeing that the public has access to all necessary information about beneficiaries of CAP funding;

Added19. Regrets that the Commission’s approach to setting up civil dialogue groups for matters covered by the CAP did not comply with the Ombudsman’s recommendations and had several gaps, in particular a failure to transparently and clearly implement a balanced representation between economic and non-economic interests in the composition of the groups;

Added20. Emphasises the importance for all institutions of treating access to documents requests in a timely manner, so that the relevance of the information is preserved; supports the Ombudsman’s special report in her strategic inquiry concerning the time the Commission takes to deal with requests for public access to documents; is concerned about the Commission’s systemic and significant delays in processing such requests; underlines that public access to documents is a fundamental right under Regulation 1049/2001; urges the Commission to improve its administrative practices in order to respect the timelines set out by the legislator and to clearly and proactively demonstrate that transparency is the rule and a priority in its handling of requests for public access to documents; stresses the need for the EU institutions to dedicate sufficient human resources to improving efficiency in the handling of access to documents requests; recalls that the Ombudsman recommended a fundamental restructuring of the Commission’s approach to processing access to document requests;

Added21. Acknowledges the Ombudsman’s inquiry into the Commission’s failure to identify and therefore to assess the potential disclosure of the text messages exchanged between the Commission President and the CEO of a pharmaceutical company on the purchase of a COVID-19 vaccine; is worried that the Commission’s approach constituted maladministration; underlines that work-related text and instant messages are ‘documents’ under Regulation 1049/2001 and stresses that respecting this principle is of particular importance; welcomes the Ombudsman’s recommendations for the EU administration on the recording of work-related text and instant messages; stresses the importance for the EU institutions of fully complying with these recommendations in order to bring the practices of the EU administration into line with modern communication methods; takes note of the Commission’s response that it will issue further guidance on modern communication tools such as text messages;

Added22. Calls on the Council to learn a lesson from the Ombudsman’s inquiry into its refusal to give full public access to documents related to negotiations on the draft ‘Digital Markets Act’, which, in 2022, resulted in the Ombudsman’s conclusion that there was maladministration; calls on the Council to apply the highest standards of transparency in these cases, especially when the Ombudsman has already identified problems in previous strategic inquiries concerning the transparency of its legislative process and its decision-making during the COVID-19 crisis; recalls that transparency is one of the key principles set out in the EU Treaties and that a lack of transparency risks diminishing citizens’ trust in the European institutions and the EU as a whole;

23. Stresses the importance of the Ombudsman’s investigations into human rights compliance by the EU administration; supports the Ombudsman’s call for the Commission to set up a new and separate complaint handling portal for alleged human rights abuses, and to make it accessible for human rights-related complaints by civil society organisations and other stakeholders in countries with which the EU has trade deals;

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Changed15.24. Points out that the Ombudsman conducted a strategic inquiry into how Frontex complies with its fundamental rights and transparency obligations under its expanded mandate under Regulation 2019/1896;2019/1896, stresses the importance of applying high transparency standards to allow for public scrutiny and of ensuring full respect for fundamental rights in all of Frontex’s operations to improve its accountability; calls on Frontex to ensure an adequate follow-up to the recommendations issued by the Ombudsman;

Change 12

Added25. Notes the Ombudsman’s inquiry into the Commission’s system monitoring the Croatian authorities’ respect for fundamental rights in the context of border management operations supported by EU funds, in the conclusion of which the Ombudsman criticised the Commission for its delay in setting up an appropriate monitoring mechanism for border management by the Croatian authorities; urges the Commission to always react promptly to the Ombudsman’s suggestions for improvement, in particular in cases like this one, when significant shortcomings are identified;

26. Welcomes the fact that, on the basis of the Ombudsman’s practical recommendations on the use of official languages when communicating with the public, the network of EU agencies agreed on the guidelines on multilingual policies;

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Changed17.27. Takes note that in 2022, the Statute of the European Ombudsman was updated with implementing provisions detailing the working procedures of the Ombudsman’s Office; believes that the new provisions will contribute to improving the Ombudsman’s work;

28. Welcomes the Ombudsman’s commitment to monitor the EU administration’s implementation of the UN CRPD; appreciates the Ombudsman’s work as a member of the EU Framework for the UN CRPD;

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Changed19.29. Underlines the results of the Ombudsman’s own-initiative inquiry into how the Commission monitors EU Structural and Investment (ESI) fundsFunds to ensure that funds are used to strengthen the rights of persons with disabilities to independent living and inclusion; welcomes the suggestion of clearer guidance about the need to promote deinstitutionalisation in the context of the use of ESIEU funds;Structural and Investment Funds ;

30. Encourages the Ombudsman to continue the exchanges on experiences and best practices with national ombudsmen through the European Network of Ombudsmen (ENO); appreciates that the 2022 ENO annual conference focused on best practices for helping refugees and addressed the effects of the digitalisation of public services on citizens’ rights; commends the addition of the Ukrainian and Moldovan ombudsman’s offices to the ENO;

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Removed21. Encourages the fruitful dialogue between the Ombudsman and the Committee on Petitions of the European Parliament; underlines that the intensive collaboration between these two bodies helps to increase the democratic accountability of the EU institutions;

Added31. Welcomes the Ombudsman’s continuous efforts to further improve the visibility of its activities, including via online tools and the multilingual website offering assistance in all 24 official languages of the EU;

Added32. Welcomes the fruitful, long-standing dialogue between the Ombudsman and the European Parliament’s Committee on Petitions; underlines that the intensive collaboration between these two bodies helps to increase the democratic accountability of the EU institutions and bring them closer to citizens;

33. Instructs its President to forward this resolution and the report of the Committee on Petitions to the Council, the Commission, the European Ombudsman, the governments and parliaments of the Member States, and their ombudsmen or similar competent bodies.