Bruno Waterfield reckons “the genie’s out of the bottle” as regards transparency of MEPs’ expenses.

Scientifically speaking, genies aren’t necessarily precursors to disaster. Perhaps he means Pandora’s box has been opened.

Whatever. Is it true? Only partially. The outing of a few Tory MEPs isn’t exactly a revolution in Brussels. The problem remains that there are 700 more MEPs to think about, many of whom publish minimal information about how their allowances are spent. Indeed, it’s only the fact that MEPs Purvis and Chichester were slightly more open than others that allowed them to be caught out.

Now, it’s likely that Bruno has more information than he’s able to publish at the moment. He’s hinted as much. So my doubts may be invalidated in a welter of scandal over the coming weeks.

But the inadequacy of Parliament’s transparency rules suggests otherwise.

Rule 9 says “Parliament may lay down rules governing the transparency of its Members’ financial interests, which shall be attached to these Rules of Procedure as an annex.”

Turning to the annex, we find Article 2:

“Article 2

The Quaestors shall keep a register in which each Member shall make a personal, detailed declaration of:

(a)    his professional activities and any other remunerated functions or activities,

(b)    any support, whether financial or in terms of staff or material, additional to that provided by Parliament and granted to the Member in connection with his political activities by third parties, whose identity shall be disclosed.”

The loopholes this offers are enthusiastically exploited. There’s no requirement for MEPs to publish the names of service companies, and even if there were it’s a hell of a task to find out whether the same MEPs are actually directors or otherwise closely involved. The exhortation to publish a “detailed” declaration is totally ignored and there’s no requirement for them to explain what they actually spend the money on. Assistants don’t need to be named, so even if we know that MEP Miggins has six paid helpers they could be sitting watching daytime TV for all we know, or seconded to socialist think tanks, or flying around Asia, all on our money.

Of course clowns like Pottering, the President of Parliament, are hoping none of this will change before the 2009 elections. And I’m not sure he’s wrong.

The current amazing factlet on the European Parliament’s website is about our old friend Hans-Gert Pöttering.

Did you know… that before becoming President of the EP Hans-Gert Pöttering had been the leader of the EPP-ED group for seven years (1999-2007)?

Well no, I didn’t. But it doesn’t surprise me that Pöttering is a career politician. Indeed, his CV is less than amazing, since it reveals that Hans-Gert is one of many MEPs who’s never really had a proper job. After his studies he became a research assistant, and was elected to the Parliament in 1979.

Slightly more interesting and ironic is that his CV makes a big deal of his Catholic background, and how it informs his political views. Which stirs memories of Rocco Buttiglione, the Italian candidate for Commissioner of Justice and Home Affairs. That’s the fellow who Parliament rejected because of his Catholic background and the way it informed his political views.

When I say “EU money”, of course, I mean our money.

The rumours have been floating around for some weeks that allowances to MEPs have been diverted to fund political campaigning in Germany. My understanding is that there exists a second report on Parliamentary expenses, containing allegations even worse than the original auditor’s report that made the headlines in February.

However, I notice that Paul van Buitenen has also published a letter to the President of the EU Parliament pointing out the total inactivity and unwillingness to investigate. Along the way, he mentions the following examples of MEPs sticking their nose into the trough too enthusiastically:

kickback payments, fake places of residence, irregular pension benefits, faking of signatures, abuses of visitors group reimbursements and funding of campaign activities.

What does this mean? Well, not much on its own. It’s a small step towards exposing what fraudulent MEPs get up to, and yet another minor embarrassment for the president Hans-Gert Pöttering.

As I’ve suggested before, Pöttering is the main obstacle to creating a transparent payments system in Parliament. The fact that he refuses to respond to van Buitenen’s complaints only confirms this.

Time and time again, the name of the EU Parliament President Hans-Gert Poettering is mentioned when the issue of tranparency is raised.

And every time, he appears as an obstacle to getting anything done. Yesterday yet another article appeared in the German press in which Hans-Gert emerged as an enemy of transparency.

Van Buitenen criticised the President of the European Parliament, Hans-Gert Poettering (CDU). “I’m not at all persuaded that things are improving” [referring to Parliament’s plan to change its system for accounting for expenses in 2009]. There have been several meetings with the President, but the fraudulent use of expenses won’t change. Van Buitenen told this newspaper that the head of Parliament is strongly resisting the introduction of transparent accounting.

But let’s not pretend Poettering is the only culprit here, even if he appears as the person who is least willing to change. There are plenty of MEPs hiding behind the President. What’s more, the other institutions such as OLAF and anti-fraud commissioner Siim Kallas are doing very little to encourage change.

England Expects notes that Parliament is creating a five thousand euro prize for journalism. Here’s the blurb from the special website set up to publicise it:

“The first European Parliament Prize for Journalism will be awarded in 2008. It will be given to journalists who have dealt with major issues at a European level or have promoted a better understanding of the EU institutions and/or EU policies.”

I can just imagine the awards ceremony. President Pottering, in bow tie and clean shirt, takes to the stage at the glittering event. The chatter of assembled sycophants slowly dies down. Pottering clears his throat significantly.

“Ladies and Gentlemen”, he says. “For his courageous work in exposing the racket of MEP’s expenses, and for his remarkable articles promoting a better understanding of the massive fraud in the EU’s regional policy, I am delighted to award the first European Parliament Prize for Journalism to Serge Dupont”.

Considering the jury will include three MEPs, the chances that the prize-winning journalism will do anything to undermine Parliament’s gravy train are slim. The prize is clearly an attempt to bring the media a step closer to being under the control of the EU.

In the Telegraph, Bruno Waterfield highlights an article in Stern discussing the ongoing controversy about fraudulent use of expenses in the European Parliament.

This time, it’s Hans-Martin Tillack complaining. He’s the reporter who the EU’s anti-fraud office had arrested by Belgian police for exposing fraud. Sadly Tillack is now on the Berlin beat, and is unable to give the issue much of his time.

However, he does note that MEPs have been unable to account for 76 million euros in expenses from the years 2004 and 2005. Receipts for a further 40 million euros were received but not accepted as valid. Only 45 million euros have been properly accounted for.

Bruno Waterfield reports that Parliament’s President Hans-Gert Pöttering gave a press conference yesterday, and tried to wave away the problem.

In his first major press conference, at a Brussels summit, since the scandal and secrecy surrounding misuse of allowances broke, Mr Pöttering relied on tried and tested European Union cultural relativism to get himself off the hook.

Asked why the Parliament did not clean up its act, the institution’s President claimed that in the EU one man’s expense scam could be another man’s legitimate claim on allowances. It’s a cultural thing, don’t you know?