During a three-and-a-half-hour session discussing the 26 declarations in alphabetical order, grievances between political groups quickly came to the fore. One of the MEPs quoted above said the meeting was “mayhem” with a lot of factions “fighting.”
The MEPs on the committee do background checks as the first part of the Parliament’s screening process. They have the power to reject nominees if they feel there’s a conflict of interest. The next stage is a grilling by relevant parliamentary committees, to take place from Nov. 4 to 12.
The committee ultimately agreed, by a simple majority, that 23 of the Commission nominees should be sent a set of general questions. That will allow them to provide more information, as a lot of the forms were largely empty, as POLITICO reported. The commissioners fill in the declarations themselves and can choose what to answer.
On paper, nominees are supposed to disclose any assets above €10,000, and lawmakers saw it as “hardly credible” that just a few nominees disclosed such wealth, one of the MEPs said, adding that the extra questions were “to ensure that they had all understood the meaning of the exercise.”
The Left’s chief, Manon Aubry, was outraged at the lack of transparency in the process, arguing her group is “angry” because commissioners did not declare enough information.
“It’s a fake process because there is not sufficient time to do proper scrutiny. It’s a fake process because it’s done beyond closed doors,” she said at a press conference.