Lobbying on PFAS
Dear Secretariat General of the European Commission,
Under the right of access to documents in the EU treaties, as developed in Regulation 1049/2001, I would like to request access to the following documents related to lobbying on PFAS, per and polyfluoroalkyl substances. In particular I would like:
1. A list of all meetings/ discussions since 1 April 2022 between officials and or Commissioners with businesses, trade associations, or think tanks where this topic was discussed.
2. Any records, minutes or notes of these meetings/discussions.
3. All correspondence since 1 April 2022, where this topic was discussed, exchanged between officials and or Commissioners with businesses, trade associations, or think tanks.
To the extent possible, my strong preference is to receive documents in electronic format.
I would also be grateful to receive the documents in batches, as soon as they are identified and available to send.
Please note that I am tabling this request separately to DG Grow, DG Environment, and the Secretariat-General of the Commission and I look forward to receiving the respective documents accordingly.
Thank you in advance.
Yours faithfully,
Vicky Cann
CEO
Rue d'Edimbourg 26
1050 Brx
Dear Sir or Madam,
We hereby acknowledge the receipt of your request for access to documents
sent on 31/03/2023 and registered on 03/04/2023 under the case number
2023/2042.
We will handle your request within 15 working days as of the date of
registration. The time-limit expires on 27/04/2023. We will let you know
if we need to extend this time limit for additional 15 working days.
To find more information on how we process your personal data, please see
[1]the privacy statement.
Yours faithfully,
Secretariat-General - Access to Documents
European Commission
References
Visible links
1. https://ec.europa.eu/info/principles-and...
Dear Mrs Cann,
We are writing concerning your request for access to Commission documents
registered on 03/04/2023 under case number 2023/2042.
We are currently working on your request. However, we have not yet been
able to gather all the elements necessary to carry out a full analysis of
your request. We will not be able to send you the reply within the
prescribed time limit expiring on 27/04/2023.
Therefore, in line with Article 7(3) of [1]Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001,
we need to extend this time limit by 15 additional working days. The new
time limit expires on 23/05/2023.
We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause.
Kind regards,
SG D Secretariat
References
Visible links
1. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/...
Dear Ms Cann,
Please find attached a message concerning your request for access to
Commission documents registered under the above case number 2023/2042.
Please acknowledge the receipt of this message by return email.
Kind regards,
SG.D2 Secretariat
Dear Secretariat General of the European Commission,
Thank you for the documents.
Yours faithfully,
Vicky Cann
Dear Secretariat General of the European Commission,
Thank you for the documents for request 2023/2042. I have now had the chance to go through them and have several questions and queries:
- It makes it rather difficult to handle the files as several of the 36 documents provided have been given exactly the same name or reference number. Next to no information is provided in the table about who the correspondence was to and from, to provide further clues.
- From what I can tell I am missing the following documents as per the first column in the document table provided: 1, 3, 3.2, 4.1, 4.2, 7, 10.2, 14, 16, 16.2, 24.2, 25.1, 25.2. It is not clear to me why these have not been sent. In some places the table mentions that certain documents are "out of scope" but it is not clear what this refers to. Surely if they are not relevant to the request they should not be listed at all. If some documents are not being released that should be properly explained within the rules of regulation 1049.
- I find some of the redactions extreme - for example, the removal of correspondence dates and the names of correspondents who are in the public eye such as MPs, CEOs etc.
- Finally I asked for lobbying on PFAS with particular regard to "businesses, trade associations, or think tanks". In fact hardly any of the documents relate to businesses, trade associations, or think tanks. Please could you confirm that this did form the focus of the document searches performed?
I can put all of this into a confirmatory application but perhaps it would be easier if these questions could be resolved bilaterally first?
Thank you in advance.
Yours faithfully,
Vicky Cann
Your message has been received by the Transparency Unit of the
Secretariat-General of the European Commission.
Requests for public access to documents are treated on the basis of
[1]Regulation (EC) No 1049/2001 of 30 May 2001 regarding public access to
European Parliament, Council and Commission documents.
The Secretariat-General will reply to your request within 15 working days
upon registration of your request and will duly inform you of the
registration of the request (or of any additional information to be
provided in view of its registration and/or treatment).
L’unité «Transparence» du secrétariat général de la Commission européenne
a bien reçu votre message.
Les demandes d’accès du public aux documents sont traitées sur la base du
[2]règlement (CE) n° 1049/2001 du 30 mai 2001 relatif à l’accès du public
aux documents du Parlement européen, du Conseil et de la Commission.
Le secrétariat général répondra à votre demande dans un délai de 15 jours
ouvrables à compter de la date d’enregistrement de votre demande, et vous
informera de cet enregistrement (ou vous indiquera toute information
supplémentaire à fournir en vue de l'enregistrement et/ou du traitement de
votre demande).
Ihre Nachricht ist beim Referat „Transparenz“ des Generalsekretariats der
Europäischen Kommission eingegangen.
Anträge auf Zugang zu Dokumenten werden auf der Grundlage der
[3]Verordnung (EG) Nr. 1049/2001 vom 30. Mai 2001 über den Zugang der
Öffentlichkeit zu Dokumenten des Europäischen Parlaments, des Rates und
der Kommission behandelt.
Das Generalsekretariat beantwortet Ihre Anfrage innerhalb von
15 Arbeitstagen nach deren Registrierung und wird Sie über die
Registrierung Ihres Antrags (oder die Notwendigkeit weiterer Informationen
im Hinblick auf dessen Registrierung und/oder Bearbeitung) unterrichten.
References
Visible links
1. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/...
2. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/...
3. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/...
Link: [1]File-List
Link: [2]themeData
Link: [3]colorSchemeMapping
[4]Re: access to documents request - Lobbying on PFAS - EASE 2023/2042 -
Ares(2023)3527844 (Please use this link only if you are an Ares user –
Svp, utilisez ce lien exclusivement si vous êtes un(e) utilisateur d’Ares)
Dear Ms Cann
Thank you for your email dated 11 May. Please find below our reply to your
points as well as the Excel file of disclosed documents with further
explanatory comments.
- It makes it rather difficult to handle the files as several of the 36
documents provided have been given exactly the same name or reference
number. Next to no information is provided in the table about who the
correspondence was to and from, to provide further clues. – We understand
that it may not be easy to navigate through all the documents, please note
that some of the ‘documents’ listed are actually folders, ie 1, 3, 7
whereas the actual documents are numbered 3.2, 4.1 etc (the attached Excel
file provides further information).
- From what I can tell I am missing the following documents as per the
first column in the document table provided: 1, 3, 3.2, 4.1, 4.2, 7, 10.2,
14, 16, 16.2, 24.2, 25.1, 25.2. It is not clear to me why these have not
been sent. In some places the table mentions that certain documents are
"out of scope" but it is not clear what this refers to. Surely if they are
not relevant to the request they should not be listed at all. If some
documents are not being released that should be properly explained within
the rules of regulation 1049. – Please see the excel table with the
additions clarifying that all the documents have been released - some
reference numbers are not documents but folders.
- Finally I asked for lobbying on PFAS with particular regard to
"businesses, trade associations, or think tanks". In fact hardly any of
the documents relate to businesses, trade associations, or think tanks.
Please could you confirm that this did form the focus of the document
searches performed? - We confirm.
Best regards
SG.D2 Secretariat