Ombudsman slams Commission for secrecy over official’s move to law firm

The Commission needs to pay heed to the “corrosive effect of the ‘revolving door’ phenomenon,” she said, “which can have a negative impact on public trust, feed Eurosceptic sentiment and undermine the EU’s trade, competition or other interests.”

“The lack of information from the Commission on any restrictions it may have placed on the activities of the former staff member, with a view to mitigating the risk of conflicts of interest, has compounded the matter,” she said.

O’Reilly told the Commission two years ago to take a tougher line on former staffers’ moves to the private sector where they may end up lobbying the EU executive or defending clients against EU investigations.

That inquiry was prompted by the move of the EU’s top merger official, Carlos Esteva Mosso, to a law firm. Two other antitrust officials, Nicholas Banasevic and Cecilio Madero Villarejo also quit the commission to work for law firms, with Madero later moving to a consultancy.

O’Reilly told von der Leyen that she’d asked the Commission to be more robust in how it handles these moves and publicize any restrictions placed on officials.

“When an intended post-service activity poses risks that cannot be adequately mitigated by restrictions or when restrictions cannot be effectively monitored or enforced, I said that it would be prudent to (temporarily) forbid (former) staff members from taking up such positions,” she said.

The Commission’s competition department faced protests last year over its selection of a U.S. economist to fill a key antitrust post. A transparency campaign group has also criticized the regulator over potential conflicts of interest from ‘revolving door’ job moves.

The Commission did not immediately respond to a POLITICO request for comment.