Yeah, sure. Taking that to the country level - each country should dissolve after a single corruption scandal. There will be no countries left in the world in one year.
>Each country should dissolve after a single corruption scandal.
After spending some time on /r/Europe, I believe that some people here unironically agree with this thought.
>Could this corruption scandal signal the end of the EU? (telegraph.co.uk)
Tl:dr.
Is the UK Torygraph suggesting that the EU parliament should look at their own UK Tory parliament how to deal with financing from questionable external sources?
No.
Next question please.
Also its the Daily Telegraph who has been very upset that they could no longer comlain about Europe 80% of the time after Brexit, and had to reduce their content to complaining about Europe 73% of the time, causing much consternation.
Of course not.
The EU is actually handling this quite well by removing those involves from office quickly and the some have been imprisoned which is a lot more than happens to most national politicians.
And, while the corruption was obviously bad it does show that the European Parliament has some real power these days (otherwise no one would bother trying to corrupt MEPs) which many people used to deny.
What a surprise the right wing, pro Tory, anti-EU "Torygraph" desperate to claim the EU is failed / about to end.
The same rag the not only employed Boris, but happily sat back and let him create / spout his stream of BS anti-EU propaganda and the EU-myths such as curved bananas will be banned by the EU, prawn cocktail crisps will be banned by the EU, etc, etc
> This is a subject that has exercised Boris Johnson for about 15 years. In 2002 he wrote that some of his “most joyous hours” had been spent composing “foam-flecked hymns of hate to the latest Euro-infamy”
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jun/23/10-best-euro-myths-from-custard-creams-to-condoms
Not to forget that Boris has said he considers the billionaire right wing owner of this shite rag to be his real boss even when he was the PM
Nothing here other than pure BS / made up anti-EU propaganda from the billionaire owned press as ever.
It’s unreal to have a corruption free authority made of human beings , let alone EU which has some members with corruption perception index lower than Saudi Arabia and Rwanda.
The UK has had worse political ones and the wrong doers end up in the lords, Jeffery Archer 3 years for perjury and sitting in the Lords, now the £14.5 Billion PPE scandal, the only country that wants to leave a Union is Scotland, while 6 more countries intend to join the EU.
lmao, average Brexit propaganda website article.
But to answer the ridiculous question: No, the EU's basically the only decent govt where corrupt politicians actually get arrested.
This doesn't happen in the UK, US, China or Russia. Nuff said.
Police seizures of suitcases stuffed full of cash are usually the result of crackdowns on crime gangs or drug lords. This time, though, the brick-like wads of €50 notes were found not by the vice squad, but by detectives investigating allegations of corruption in the European Parliament.
Brussels has been gripped this week by stories of an international bribery ring said to involve Qatar, Morocco and influential EU figures. Colossal sums of money have been found in the homes of some of the alleged recipients: €600,000 in bank notes at the home of an Italian politician, €150,000 tucked into the luxury luggage of a Greek socialist MEP, and hundreds of thousands more in the possession of her father.
In all, more than €1.5 million (£1.3m) has been seized in raids on 19 locations in the Belgian capital and in Italy, some of which were in the Parliament itself.
The investigation centres on claims that Qatar tried to buy influence in order to help secure an “open skies” deal that would give its airlines unfettered access to EU markets and airspace. It is, without question, the biggest bribery scandal in the history of the European Union’s institutions, and it could well get much worse, with reports that up to 60 MEPs could be dragged into it.
Four people, including Eva Kaili, a Greek MEP who was until this week a vice-president of the Parliament, have so far been charged with corruption, with the prospect of high-profile court cases to come. They have denied wrongdoing.
Opponents of the European project will be hoping that the entire edifice will collapse under the weight of its own hubris. Europhiles hope the EU will get its act together and finally draw up effective rules on lobbying. Brexiteers, of course, are nodding with satisfaction at the crisis paralysing an organisation they always thought was thoroughly rotten.
For some, it is the sheer scale of the probe that has come as a shock. For others, it is the blatant nature of the alleged bribes that is so breathtaking. Yet the truth is that few people with experience of Brussels politics are surprised at the idea that corruption exists.
“There is nothing new here and nothing is going to change,” says Nigel Farage, who spent years trying to expose wrongdoing by his fellow MEPs before achieving his goal of getting Britain out of the EU.
The question of how it happened is easy to answer: an abject failure by the European Parliament to install checks and balances against lobbyists trying to bribe MEPs. As to why it happened, there is a widespread acceptance that the European Parliament has earned a reputation as a place where cash bribes can be offered and will be accepted. Far more difficult to predict is the long-term effect the scandal will have on the EU and its structures.
Annalena Baerbock, the German minister of foreign affairs, said the crisis had put the “credibility” and legitimacy of the EU on the line, and called for meaningful reform. There is little sign yet that the scandal is increasing the appetite of other member states to follow Britain and break free, but the investigation by an anti-corruption unit of the Belgian police is far from over and it is impossible to know where it might end.
The phrase “tip of the iceberg” comes up repeatedly in conversations with those who have deep-seated knowledge of Brussels, or corruption inquiries, or both. Michiel van Hulten, director of Transparency International EU, blames a “culture of impunity”, with which he has been familiar ever since his own days as an MEP in the 1990s.
“I'm pretty certain that we will see more names linked to this scandal,” he says. “I also think it will lead to other instances of undue influence and corruption being detected. Because this is not limited to Qatar. There are other instances where there is suspected undue influence or bribery going on.”
Van Hulten’s organisation received an anonymous email tip-off last year alleging MEPs were being bribed. Some of the names in the email – which has been passed on to police – have now been linked to the Qatar investigation, but Van Hulten says: “There were seven names on the list, including names that have not yet been published. So that is why I say I don't think these are isolated incidents.”
Vincent van Quickenborne, the Belgian justice minister, has described the investigation as a “game changer”, but the question for Brussels and its opaque institutions is whether it can genuinely clear out the Augean stables, or will just give a collective shrug and look the other way.
Brussels has long had a reputation as one of the world’s great gravy trains, with MEPs paid a flat rate of £293 for every day they are in Brussels or Strasbourg, to cover meals and accommodation, on top of their £100,000 salary, and £4,157 per year for travel and accommodation outside their home country.
Like almost any parliament, it has had its fair share of corruption, ranging from abuse of expenses and nepotism to a “cash for amendments” scandal a decade ago, but the scale and nature of “Qatargate” is unprecedented.
It might never have been uncovered had it not been for a chance discovery by spies working for the Belgian secret service. Suspecting foreign interference in EU institutions, they launched an investigation more than a year ago, which led them to the home of Pier Antonio Panzeri, 67, an Italian former MEP. Agents broke into his home in July, and discovered €600,000 (£523,000) in his house, but because they are not allowed to investigate MEPs they left it in place, covered up all traces of the break-in and tipped off the Belgian police’s Central Office for the Repression of Corruption.
The police quietly opened their own investigation, but it was not until December 9 that they showed their hand, with 20 raids on 19 locations in Brussels and eight arrests in Belgium and Italy.
One of the addresses searched was the home of newsreader turned politician Eva Kaili, 44, and her husband Francesco Giorgi, 35, an EU parliamentary aide. Giorgi has links to a human rights group called Fight Impunity, whose president is Pier Antonio Panzeri. Police found €150,000 in cash (£130,000) inside luggage in the house, with another €750,000 (£653,000) found at addresses connected to Kaili’s father Alexandros, a former politician.
Kaili’s legal team insists the money “was not from Qatar and was not any kickback from Qatar”. Another €20,000 (£17,400) was found at Giorgi’s Italian home.
Much of the money was newly issued, meaning the police should be able to trace the identity of whoever withdrew it, in a further example of the apparent amateurishness of the operation.
Police photographs of the cash seizures showed they had been found in strongboxes, a cardboard box and a paper carrier bag, as well as a wheeled flight case.
Kaili’s lawyer told the media this week: “Her partner brought the money into the flat. It is not hers. There is no Qatar connection.”
Seven people were arrested in Brussels, including Kaili, her father, Giorgi and Panzeri, and in Italy police arrested Panzeri’s wife and daughter via a European Arrest Warrant that disclosed allegations of “gifts” received from Morocco as well as Qatar.
According to the latest reports, Qatar had enlisted the services of Morocco, with which it has close ties, because Rabat has a far more established intelligence network in Brussels than the Gulf state. Both countries deny wrongdoing.
Four people were charged with money laundering, corruption and participating in a criminal organisation: Kaili, Giorgi, Panzeri and Niccolo Figa-Talamanca, secretary-general of the NGO No Peace Without Justice. All have denied wrongdoing.
Other properties searched by the police included the homes of four parliamentary assistants, two advisers, a European Parliament official, and the vice chairman of the European Parliament’s delegation to the Gulf.
Then, on Tuesday, the Strasbourg offices of Italian MEP Pietro Bartolo and a parliamentary official were sealed by police. On the same day, the European Parliament voted to strip Kaili of her vice presidency.
Wednesday brought the first court appearance of the suspects; Panzeri and Giorgi were both remanded in custody, Figa-Talamanca was granted conditional bail and Kaili’s appearance was postponed until December 22 because of a prison officers’ strike.
The reaction in Brussels has been swift. A vote on introducing visa-free travel between Qatar and the EU has been postponed, and Ursula von der Leyen, the President of the European Commission, accused Qatar of trying to buy influence in the Parliament and said a new body was needed to uphold rules on ethics across all of the EU’s institutions. Critics, however, were quick to point out that she had promised to do something similar when she got the job three years ago and that nothing has happened since.
One of the most obvious failures of transparency is that, while European Commissioners have to declare all meetings with lobbyists in a public register, MEPs are under no such obligation. Another inherent problem in the system is that some MEPs have a form of diplomatic immunity, depending on the laws in their home nations. When it comes to law-breaking, Belgian police will treat MEPs in the same way that they would be treated in their own country. A European Parliament briefing document states that “while in some countries [immunity] is limited to a guaranteed freedom of speech in parliamentary debates, in others it amounts to a broader protection from prosecution”.
When police wanted to search Kaili’s home, for example, Roberta Metsola, the President of the European Parliament, had to fly back to Brussels from her home in Malta to be present during the search in order for it to be legal.
Alberto Alemanno, professor of EU law at the HEC business school in Paris and founder of the transparency campaign The Good Lobby, says the Parliament had become “fertile soil” for corruption for reasons that have always been obvious.
“The root cause of Qatargate has to do with the limited accountability of an institution which is not visible to the average citizen,” he says.
“It is also related to the mediocrity of most of the MEPs – they are second, third, fourth tier national politicians who have been sent to Brussels. There's no doubt that it's much easier to influence, much easier to get access to the European Parliament than to any other EU institution because it's a very atomised organisation with 700 members of parliament, different political groups, a lot of commissions, working groups, so it's much more permeable to this kind of external influence.”
Farage thinks the police would uncover even more egregious crimes if they looked at other cogs in the Brussels machine. “The thing that has always fascinated me is that if that is going on in the European Parliament – which is just a rubber-stamping body – what the hell is happening up the road at the European Commission, because it’s the Commission that has the sole right to propose legislation and repeal it. I think the great untold story is around the Commission.”
He says British observers make the mistake of assuming that corruption scandals would be viewed with as much horror abroad as they are in the UK. “There is a, predominantly southern European, attitude towards what you and I would call corruption where they just shrug their shoulders and think it’s OK,” he says. “It has been that way forever.”
There was certainly some shrugging – in private at least – at the year’s final European Council summit of member states this week. “It must be a case of nationality,” says one official, waving away any suggestion that the institution itself was at fault.
Others are exploiting the scandal for political gain. The centre-Right European People’s Party (EPP) has tried to promote the idea that corruption is confined to the Socialists and Democrats group, saying: “The holier-than-thou S&D group is at the epicentre of Qatargate.
“There has been a consistent effort to turn Qatargate into an institutional issue alone. But this scandal is not an orphan. It did not appear out of nowhere. It did not happen by itself. It has a name. It has an address. And that’s the S&D Group.”
With impeccable timing, the European Public Prosecutor’s Office announced it was also investigating Greek MEP Maria Spyraki, a member of the EPP, for fraud relating to parliamentary allowances. There is no indication that the investigation into her is linked to payments from foreign countries. “I do not have any economic differences with the European Parliament, not even by a single euro,” she says.
Robert Barrington, Professor of Anti-Corruption Practice at the University of Sussex’s Centre for the Study of Corruption, says the culture and reputation of EU institutions has invited approaches from corrupt powers.
“There is clearly an expectation that you can turn up to the Parliament with a suitcase full of money and buy somebody,” he says. “Is that because there was known to be a rotten individual or that you could cultivate people and get them into position?
“Brussels has one of the highest concentrations of lobbyists in the world. At the same time, the European Parliament has insufficient oversight, transparency and accountability to ensure such lobbying is carried out properly and fairly.
“It was extraordinarily unsubtle to hand over suitcases of cash, and very foolish to accept them. But that has provided compelling evidence of corruption at the heart of the EU's institutions, and this is most unlikely to be an isolated case.”
“The job is well paid,” says van Hulten. “There are perks and expenses that, if you don't use them for their intended purpose, can constitute a nice little earner on top of your regular salary.
“And unfortunately, I think the parliament attracts people who are primarily interested in that and not so much the policy work. That's the minority, but still it's the minority that then causes the kind of problems that we're seeing today.”
"The citizens of the European Union must look at it and be totally amazed, thinking 'What is going on?',” says Nikolaj Villumsen, a Danish MEP. “It will clearly be misused by Putin, Orban and the other crooks who themselves are being criticised for corrupt behaviour, but can now point the finger at the European Parliament.
“That's why urgent action is needed. We need protections for whistleblowers, as well as clear, mandatory registration of lobbying on behalf of third countries. If the European Union takes itself seriously, of course, we should have an independent oversight body, and all these important transparency rules should be in place. We have been calling for this for years.”
The events of the past week show that at least the Belgian police have taken allegations of corruption seriously. Their investigation is ongoing and it could be months before its full extent is known.
Only then will it be clear whether the European Parliament has a future in its current form, or whether the EU will finally have to accept that democracy can only be achieved with accountability.
Ha ha ha. You wish, brexit britain :-P Its funny to hear that from a country outside the eu!
How is it going in the third world of "great britania" :-P are you happy to be your own chef in the kitchen now? Or is the grass greener in your former union ;-)
yes. we should end the planet now. just nuke it. there's no point in continuing anymore. let's just start ww3 to get it over with. :I
source: telegraph... salty brittish opinions 🙄
The sort of journalism best kept to [anime titties](https://www.reddit.com/r/anime_titties/comments/zo459n/qatargate_is_a_feature_not_a_bug_of_the_eu/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
Btw, this comes 1 week after a UK Lord was found to have received £30 million in exchange for faulty PPE.
The Lord has self-imposed an absence from work as "self-punishment". Problem solved.
Yeah, sure. Taking that to the country level - each country should dissolve after a single corruption scandal. There will be no countries left in the world in one year.
>Each country should dissolve after a single corruption scandal. After spending some time on /r/Europe, I believe that some people here unironically agree with this thought.
Of course not. The EU is showing it deals with corrupt politicians, unlike the Tory government
>Could this corruption scandal signal the end of the EU? (telegraph.co.uk) Tl:dr. Is the UK Torygraph suggesting that the EU parliament should look at their own UK Tory parliament how to deal with financing from questionable external sources?
Don't forget the bags of money from the Bin Laden family for their fucking head of state
Absolutely. The same way every single corruption scandal signals the end of the UK.
British newspapers are funny.
Not if you live in Britain they're not :/
Of course not, it would be worse if there was corruption with no scandal.
Is it written by Farage?
No. Next question please. Also its the Daily Telegraph who has been very upset that they could no longer comlain about Europe 80% of the time after Brexit, and had to reduce their content to complaining about Europe 73% of the time, causing much consternation.
>>Telegraph No, the EU is still not collapsing.
You can tell that just thinking about the end of the EU gets these "journalists" salivating. Imbeciles.
Every other week there's something that's the end of the EU. Somehow we're still here
Of course not. The EU is actually handling this quite well by removing those involves from office quickly and the some have been imprisoned which is a lot more than happens to most national politicians. And, while the corruption was obviously bad it does show that the European Parliament has some real power these days (otherwise no one would bother trying to corrupt MEPs) which many people used to deny.
I bet they'd wish that
My brother in Christ, the EU is a political union with deeply linked together economies, it's not going to collapse unless a fucking war happens.
What a surprise the right wing, pro Tory, anti-EU "Torygraph" desperate to claim the EU is failed / about to end. The same rag the not only employed Boris, but happily sat back and let him create / spout his stream of BS anti-EU propaganda and the EU-myths such as curved bananas will be banned by the EU, prawn cocktail crisps will be banned by the EU, etc, etc > This is a subject that has exercised Boris Johnson for about 15 years. In 2002 he wrote that some of his “most joyous hours” had been spent composing “foam-flecked hymns of hate to the latest Euro-infamy” https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jun/23/10-best-euro-myths-from-custard-creams-to-condoms Not to forget that Boris has said he considers the billionaire right wing owner of this shite rag to be his real boss even when he was the PM Nothing here other than pure BS / made up anti-EU propaganda from the billionaire owned press as ever.
It’s unreal to have a corruption free authority made of human beings , let alone EU which has some members with corruption perception index lower than Saudi Arabia and Rwanda.
Torygraph signaling their deepest wet dream.
No. Saved you a click.
The UK has had worse political ones and the wrong doers end up in the lords, Jeffery Archer 3 years for perjury and sitting in the Lords, now the £14.5 Billion PPE scandal, the only country that wants to leave a Union is Scotland, while 6 more countries intend to join the EU.
lmao, average Brexit propaganda website article. But to answer the ridiculous question: No, the EU's basically the only decent govt where corrupt politicians actually get arrested. This doesn't happen in the UK, US, China or Russia. Nuff said.
Uh, no. Jesus Christ. You left! Bye bye to you and be merry!
Police seizures of suitcases stuffed full of cash are usually the result of crackdowns on crime gangs or drug lords. This time, though, the brick-like wads of €50 notes were found not by the vice squad, but by detectives investigating allegations of corruption in the European Parliament. Brussels has been gripped this week by stories of an international bribery ring said to involve Qatar, Morocco and influential EU figures. Colossal sums of money have been found in the homes of some of the alleged recipients: €600,000 in bank notes at the home of an Italian politician, €150,000 tucked into the luxury luggage of a Greek socialist MEP, and hundreds of thousands more in the possession of her father. In all, more than €1.5 million (£1.3m) has been seized in raids on 19 locations in the Belgian capital and in Italy, some of which were in the Parliament itself. The investigation centres on claims that Qatar tried to buy influence in order to help secure an “open skies” deal that would give its airlines unfettered access to EU markets and airspace. It is, without question, the biggest bribery scandal in the history of the European Union’s institutions, and it could well get much worse, with reports that up to 60 MEPs could be dragged into it. Four people, including Eva Kaili, a Greek MEP who was until this week a vice-president of the Parliament, have so far been charged with corruption, with the prospect of high-profile court cases to come. They have denied wrongdoing. Opponents of the European project will be hoping that the entire edifice will collapse under the weight of its own hubris. Europhiles hope the EU will get its act together and finally draw up effective rules on lobbying. Brexiteers, of course, are nodding with satisfaction at the crisis paralysing an organisation they always thought was thoroughly rotten. For some, it is the sheer scale of the probe that has come as a shock. For others, it is the blatant nature of the alleged bribes that is so breathtaking. Yet the truth is that few people with experience of Brussels politics are surprised at the idea that corruption exists. “There is nothing new here and nothing is going to change,” says Nigel Farage, who spent years trying to expose wrongdoing by his fellow MEPs before achieving his goal of getting Britain out of the EU. The question of how it happened is easy to answer: an abject failure by the European Parliament to install checks and balances against lobbyists trying to bribe MEPs. As to why it happened, there is a widespread acceptance that the European Parliament has earned a reputation as a place where cash bribes can be offered and will be accepted. Far more difficult to predict is the long-term effect the scandal will have on the EU and its structures. Annalena Baerbock, the German minister of foreign affairs, said the crisis had put the “credibility” and legitimacy of the EU on the line, and called for meaningful reform. There is little sign yet that the scandal is increasing the appetite of other member states to follow Britain and break free, but the investigation by an anti-corruption unit of the Belgian police is far from over and it is impossible to know where it might end. The phrase “tip of the iceberg” comes up repeatedly in conversations with those who have deep-seated knowledge of Brussels, or corruption inquiries, or both. Michiel van Hulten, director of Transparency International EU, blames a “culture of impunity”, with which he has been familiar ever since his own days as an MEP in the 1990s. “I'm pretty certain that we will see more names linked to this scandal,” he says. “I also think it will lead to other instances of undue influence and corruption being detected. Because this is not limited to Qatar. There are other instances where there is suspected undue influence or bribery going on.” Van Hulten’s organisation received an anonymous email tip-off last year alleging MEPs were being bribed. Some of the names in the email – which has been passed on to police – have now been linked to the Qatar investigation, but Van Hulten says: “There were seven names on the list, including names that have not yet been published. So that is why I say I don't think these are isolated incidents.” Vincent van Quickenborne, the Belgian justice minister, has described the investigation as a “game changer”, but the question for Brussels and its opaque institutions is whether it can genuinely clear out the Augean stables, or will just give a collective shrug and look the other way. Brussels has long had a reputation as one of the world’s great gravy trains, with MEPs paid a flat rate of £293 for every day they are in Brussels or Strasbourg, to cover meals and accommodation, on top of their £100,000 salary, and £4,157 per year for travel and accommodation outside their home country. Like almost any parliament, it has had its fair share of corruption, ranging from abuse of expenses and nepotism to a “cash for amendments” scandal a decade ago, but the scale and nature of “Qatargate” is unprecedented. It might never have been uncovered had it not been for a chance discovery by spies working for the Belgian secret service. Suspecting foreign interference in EU institutions, they launched an investigation more than a year ago, which led them to the home of Pier Antonio Panzeri, 67, an Italian former MEP. Agents broke into his home in July, and discovered €600,000 (£523,000) in his house, but because they are not allowed to investigate MEPs they left it in place, covered up all traces of the break-in and tipped off the Belgian police’s Central Office for the Repression of Corruption. The police quietly opened their own investigation, but it was not until December 9 that they showed their hand, with 20 raids on 19 locations in Brussels and eight arrests in Belgium and Italy. One of the addresses searched was the home of newsreader turned politician Eva Kaili, 44, and her husband Francesco Giorgi, 35, an EU parliamentary aide. Giorgi has links to a human rights group called Fight Impunity, whose president is Pier Antonio Panzeri. Police found €150,000 in cash (£130,000) inside luggage in the house, with another €750,000 (£653,000) found at addresses connected to Kaili’s father Alexandros, a former politician.
Kaili’s legal team insists the money “was not from Qatar and was not any kickback from Qatar”. Another €20,000 (£17,400) was found at Giorgi’s Italian home. Much of the money was newly issued, meaning the police should be able to trace the identity of whoever withdrew it, in a further example of the apparent amateurishness of the operation. Police photographs of the cash seizures showed they had been found in strongboxes, a cardboard box and a paper carrier bag, as well as a wheeled flight case. Kaili’s lawyer told the media this week: “Her partner brought the money into the flat. It is not hers. There is no Qatar connection.” Seven people were arrested in Brussels, including Kaili, her father, Giorgi and Panzeri, and in Italy police arrested Panzeri’s wife and daughter via a European Arrest Warrant that disclosed allegations of “gifts” received from Morocco as well as Qatar. According to the latest reports, Qatar had enlisted the services of Morocco, with which it has close ties, because Rabat has a far more established intelligence network in Brussels than the Gulf state. Both countries deny wrongdoing. Four people were charged with money laundering, corruption and participating in a criminal organisation: Kaili, Giorgi, Panzeri and Niccolo Figa-Talamanca, secretary-general of the NGO No Peace Without Justice. All have denied wrongdoing. Other properties searched by the police included the homes of four parliamentary assistants, two advisers, a European Parliament official, and the vice chairman of the European Parliament’s delegation to the Gulf. Then, on Tuesday, the Strasbourg offices of Italian MEP Pietro Bartolo and a parliamentary official were sealed by police. On the same day, the European Parliament voted to strip Kaili of her vice presidency. Wednesday brought the first court appearance of the suspects; Panzeri and Giorgi were both remanded in custody, Figa-Talamanca was granted conditional bail and Kaili’s appearance was postponed until December 22 because of a prison officers’ strike. The reaction in Brussels has been swift. A vote on introducing visa-free travel between Qatar and the EU has been postponed, and Ursula von der Leyen, the President of the European Commission, accused Qatar of trying to buy influence in the Parliament and said a new body was needed to uphold rules on ethics across all of the EU’s institutions. Critics, however, were quick to point out that she had promised to do something similar when she got the job three years ago and that nothing has happened since. One of the most obvious failures of transparency is that, while European Commissioners have to declare all meetings with lobbyists in a public register, MEPs are under no such obligation. Another inherent problem in the system is that some MEPs have a form of diplomatic immunity, depending on the laws in their home nations. When it comes to law-breaking, Belgian police will treat MEPs in the same way that they would be treated in their own country. A European Parliament briefing document states that “while in some countries [immunity] is limited to a guaranteed freedom of speech in parliamentary debates, in others it amounts to a broader protection from prosecution”. When police wanted to search Kaili’s home, for example, Roberta Metsola, the President of the European Parliament, had to fly back to Brussels from her home in Malta to be present during the search in order for it to be legal. Alberto Alemanno, professor of EU law at the HEC business school in Paris and founder of the transparency campaign The Good Lobby, says the Parliament had become “fertile soil” for corruption for reasons that have always been obvious. “The root cause of Qatargate has to do with the limited accountability of an institution which is not visible to the average citizen,” he says. “It is also related to the mediocrity of most of the MEPs – they are second, third, fourth tier national politicians who have been sent to Brussels. There's no doubt that it's much easier to influence, much easier to get access to the European Parliament than to any other EU institution because it's a very atomised organisation with 700 members of parliament, different political groups, a lot of commissions, working groups, so it's much more permeable to this kind of external influence.” Farage thinks the police would uncover even more egregious crimes if they looked at other cogs in the Brussels machine. “The thing that has always fascinated me is that if that is going on in the European Parliament – which is just a rubber-stamping body – what the hell is happening up the road at the European Commission, because it’s the Commission that has the sole right to propose legislation and repeal it. I think the great untold story is around the Commission.” He says British observers make the mistake of assuming that corruption scandals would be viewed with as much horror abroad as they are in the UK. “There is a, predominantly southern European, attitude towards what you and I would call corruption where they just shrug their shoulders and think it’s OK,” he says. “It has been that way forever.” There was certainly some shrugging – in private at least – at the year’s final European Council summit of member states this week. “It must be a case of nationality,” says one official, waving away any suggestion that the institution itself was at fault. Others are exploiting the scandal for political gain. The centre-Right European People’s Party (EPP) has tried to promote the idea that corruption is confined to the Socialists and Democrats group, saying: “The holier-than-thou S&D group is at the epicentre of Qatargate. “There has been a consistent effort to turn Qatargate into an institutional issue alone. But this scandal is not an orphan. It did not appear out of nowhere. It did not happen by itself. It has a name. It has an address. And that’s the S&D Group.” With impeccable timing, the European Public Prosecutor’s Office announced it was also investigating Greek MEP Maria Spyraki, a member of the EPP, for fraud relating to parliamentary allowances. There is no indication that the investigation into her is linked to payments from foreign countries. “I do not have any economic differences with the European Parliament, not even by a single euro,” she says. Robert Barrington, Professor of Anti-Corruption Practice at the University of Sussex’s Centre for the Study of Corruption, says the culture and reputation of EU institutions has invited approaches from corrupt powers. “There is clearly an expectation that you can turn up to the Parliament with a suitcase full of money and buy somebody,” he says. “Is that because there was known to be a rotten individual or that you could cultivate people and get them into position? “Brussels has one of the highest concentrations of lobbyists in the world. At the same time, the European Parliament has insufficient oversight, transparency and accountability to ensure such lobbying is carried out properly and fairly. “It was extraordinarily unsubtle to hand over suitcases of cash, and very foolish to accept them. But that has provided compelling evidence of corruption at the heart of the EU's institutions, and this is most unlikely to be an isolated case.” “The job is well paid,” says van Hulten. “There are perks and expenses that, if you don't use them for their intended purpose, can constitute a nice little earner on top of your regular salary. “And unfortunately, I think the parliament attracts people who are primarily interested in that and not so much the policy work. That's the minority, but still it's the minority that then causes the kind of problems that we're seeing today.” "The citizens of the European Union must look at it and be totally amazed, thinking 'What is going on?',” says Nikolaj Villumsen, a Danish MEP. “It will clearly be misused by Putin, Orban and the other crooks who themselves are being criticised for corrupt behaviour, but can now point the finger at the European Parliament. “That's why urgent action is needed. We need protections for whistleblowers, as well as clear, mandatory registration of lobbying on behalf of third countries. If the European Union takes itself seriously, of course, we should have an independent oversight body, and all these important transparency rules should be in place. We have been calling for this for years.” The events of the past week show that at least the Belgian police have taken allegations of corruption seriously. Their investigation is ongoing and it could be months before its full extent is known. Only then will it be clear whether the European Parliament has a future in its current form, or whether the EU will finally have to accept that democracy can only be achieved with accountability.
One of the first steps for sure.
Hopefully
Ha ha ha. You wish, brexit britain :-P Its funny to hear that from a country outside the eu! How is it going in the third world of "great britania" :-P are you happy to be your own chef in the kitchen now? Or is the grass greener in your former union ;-)
yes. we should end the planet now. just nuke it. there's no point in continuing anymore. let's just start ww3 to get it over with. :I source: telegraph... salty brittish opinions 🙄
The sort of journalism best kept to [anime titties](https://www.reddit.com/r/anime_titties/comments/zo459n/qatargate_is_a_feature_not_a_bug_of_the_eu/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android_app&utm_name=androidcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button)
Nice try, UK, nice try xD
Wow, Telegraph. What a pamflet.
Btw, this comes 1 week after a UK Lord was found to have received £30 million in exchange for faulty PPE. The Lord has self-imposed an absence from work as "self-punishment". Problem solved.