An EU initiative to create more transparency in the handing out of fisheries subsidies has rather resulted in more obscurity, a new report says.
The report for FishSubsidy.org, a British NGO dedicated to obtaining and publishing data on EU funding, was authored by investigative journalist Brigitte Alfter, a co-founder of FishSubsidy.org. Headlined “Slipping through the net: How EU countries evade new budget transparency rules”, the report names and shames the worst sinners among member states in undermining transparency designs: Greece, France, Ireland, Malta and Portugal.
Denmark, Finland and Estonia emerged as Good Guys in the comparison.
In 2005, EU administrative, audit and anti-fraud commissioner Siim Kallas launched the European Transparency Initiative (ETI), a project aimed at improving transparency at the EU level.
According to the ETI, member states are required to publish the names of subsidy recipients and their operations, and the amounts of public funding allocated since 1 May 2007.
“Weaknesses” in the legal framework and “bureaucratic obfuscation” by member states have hindered the process, however, and even made it harder for EU taxpayers to find out how their money is spent in the fisheries sector, the report says.
According to FishSubsidy.org, ETI “has resulted in a single (giant) step forward but twelve steps back”.
“This report reveals an equal measures of bureaucratic incompetence and obfuscation. It should be a wake up call to the Commission and a strong indictment of member states who do not appear to take budget transparency seriously”, said Jack Thurston, Executive Director of EU Transparency, a British NGO which cooperates FishSubsidy.org, along with the American Pew Charitable Trust.