Former Commissioner Borg to return to lecturing

Former EU Commissioner Joe Borg will be returning to the University of Malta this academic year to take up his lecturing post in law and EU affairs after an absence of six years.

Personal correspondence bet­ween Dr Borg and the EU executive was yesterday made public by the European Commission which stressed he had absolutely no conflict of interest in his new roles.

This correspondence includes minutes of the Commission meeting approving Dr Borg’s new roles as a university lecturer and a part-time consultant with a Brussels-based public affairs consultancy firm, Fipra.

According to EU rules, former commissioners are entitled to a three-year transition allowance, €11,000 a month in Dr Borg’s case, to help them reintegrate in the workforce.

In the meantime, they are precluded from doing any work which might pose a conflict of interest with their previous position. To keep on getting the transitional allowance while working, former commissioners must first get the green light from the Commission.

Dr Borg’s requests were made in two e-mails he sent to the Commission’s secretary general last May asking permission to be Fipra’s independent special advisor on a part-time basis and to start lecturing again.

A memo drawn up by the office of Commission President José Manuel Barroso giving Dr Borg the go-ahead and the minutes of the college meeting on June 15 approving his new roles were also published.

According to the memo, Dr Borg’s envisaged activity with Fipra was compatible with the Commission’s code of conduct so long as, “He shall abstain from providing advice on matters related to the EU’s integrated maritime policy and common fisheries policy”.

Another condition imposed on Dr Borg is that “on all other EU matters, he shall ensure full discretion with regard to the sensitive and confidential information acquired within the context of his functions as member of the Commission”.

With regard to his demand to start lecturing, Mr Barroso recommended that this was totally compatible with the code of conduct.

Dr Borg, as Foreign Affairs Minister, was nominated as Malta’s first European Commissioner by former Prime Minister Eddie Fenech Adami soon after the referendum decision to join the EU in 2003.

He first started his work in Brussels in May 2004 as joint Commissioner for Development and in January 2005 was given the portfolio for Fisheries and Maritime Affairs.

Apart from Dr Borg’s request, the Commission yesterday also published similar demands made by other former Commissioners.

However, the correspondence in the case of former commissioners Charlie McCreevy and Günther Verheugen continued to raise eyebrows in Brussels, particularly among various NGOs in the Alliance of Lobbying Transparency and Ethics Regulation (Alter-EU), which is campaigning for stricter rules.

According to the lobby group, the documents in the case of Mr Verheugen and Mr McCreevy show the Commission’s existing checks are “inadequate and fail to prevent conflicts of interest”.

“Statements from ex-Commissioners appear to have been accepted without any further investigation,” it said.

Mr Verheugen, who was responsible for industry, has opened his own consultancy firm and is sitting on a number of boards including those of banks. Meanwhile, Mr McCreevy, who was responsible for the internal market rules, is sitting on the boards of Ryanair and NBNK Investments plc, a company which aims to buy banking assets being sold off after the financial crisis.

Alter-EU is calling on the Commission to swiftly introduce a stricter code of conduct for commissioners.

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