Travel expenses for officials paid for by non-EU governments, organisations
Dear Competition,
Under the right of access to documents in the EU treaties, as developed in Regulation 1049/2001, I am requesting documents which contain the following information:
The number of officials within DG COMP who accepted third party contributions for their missions that were not provided by EU Member States, EEA and EFTA countries, international organisations or fora, such as the UN, G20/G7 or public and private universities when the mission was for academic purposes between January 1 2022 and December 31 2022.
- All minutes, agendas, summary, correspondence, memos and any other reports drafted and received by DG Competition between January 1, 2022 and December 31, 2022 relating to the above missions.
Yours faithfully,
Edith Hancock
Rue de la Loi 62
1040 Bruxelles
Belgium
Dear Sir or Madam,
We hereby acknowledge the receipt of your request for access to documents
sent on 29/03/2023 and registered on 30/03/2023 under the case number
2023/1982.
We will handle your request within 15 working days as of the date of
registration. The time-limit expires on 25/04/2023. 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,
Directorate-General for Competition - Access to Documents
European Commission
References
Visible links
1. https://ec.europa.eu/info/principles-and...
Dear Mrs Hancock,
DG Competition staff performed 150 missions in 2022 for which expenses were totally or partially paid by third parties. All those missions were of short duration and related to participations to events, speeches, panels, conferences or lectures on various horizontal competition issues. There was no mission directly related to specific competition investigations in the list.
From those 150 missions, in line with your request, we filtered out those missions for which the costs were supported by international organisations, member States, national competition authorities, universities or academic institutions/think tanks, law reviews or publishers, non-profit organisations (like alumni conferences), professional event/conference organisators and associations of professionals (bar associations for instance).
After this filtering, there remain 23 missions involving 20 DG Competition staff members related to events organised by law firms, consultancy companies or associations representing the industry (or some sectors of the industry) for which we will retrieve and assess the relevant documents under the transparency regulation 1049/2001 and reply to you within the deadlines foreseen by the regulation.
Kind regards,
COMP ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS
Hello,
We are writing concerning your request for access to Commission documents
registered on 30/03/2023 under case number 2023/1982.
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 25/04/2023.
The reason for the extension is that the application concerns a large
number of documents.
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 22/05/2023.
We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause.
Kind regards,
ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS TEAM
European Commission
DG Competition
DG COMP.I.1 (Registry and Transparency)
[2][email address]
References
Visible links
1. https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/...
2. mailto:[email address]
Hello,
Please find attached a message concerning your request for access to
Commission documents registered under the above case number 2023/1982.
Please acknowledge the receipt of this message by return email.
Kind regards,
Hello,
Please find attached a message concerning your request for access to
Commission documents registered under the above case number 2023/1982.
Please acknowledge the receipt of this message by return email.
Kind regards,
Hello,
Please find attached a message concerning your request for access to
Commission documents registered under the above case number 2023/1982.
Please acknowledge the receipt of this message by return email.
Kind regards,
Hello,
Please find attached a message concerning your request for access to
Commission documents registered under the above case number 2023/1982.
Please acknowledge the receipt of this message by return email.
Kind regards,
Dear Competition,
I wanted to ask whether it is possible to have the names of officials who accepted third party-funded travel redacted from these documents? We would argue that it is in the public interest to do so.
Furthermore, we believe it is in the public interest that the cost of these expenses covered by law firms and consultancies be published. Are you able to share this information also?
Thank you for any help you can provide.
Yours faithfully,
Christina GENNET
Dear Ms Gennet,
I refer to your email of 11 September 2023, in which you submit a request
to receive the names of the officials that have been redacted from the
documents provided to you by the European Commission on 17 May 2023. In
this context, the first part of your request needs to be considered as a
confirmatory application in accordance with Article 7(2) of Regulation
1049/2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and
Commission documents[1] (hereafter Regulation 1049/2001).
I regret to inform you that your confirmatory application was lodged
outside the applicable deadline defined in Article 7(2) of Regulation
1049/2001. That Article provides that in the event of a total or partial
refusal, the applicant may, within 15 working days of receiving the
institution’s reply, make a confirmatory application asking the
institution to reconsider its position. Following the transmission of the
European Commission's reply on 17 May 2023, the applicable deadline for
lodging a confirmatory application ended on 9 June 2023.
Consequently, the Commission is not in a position to handle your
application.
As regards the second part of your request concerning the publication of
the cost of the expenses covered by law firms and consultancies and which
constitutes a new request, this will be handled as a request for
information under the Code of Good Administrative Behaviour and you can
expect a reply within 15 working days.
Yours sincerely,
ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS TEAM
European Commission
DG Competition
DG COMP.I.1 (Registry and Transparency)
[1][email address]
Dear Ms Gennet,
Unfortunately, we won’t be able to send you a reply within the time limit
mentioned below since the answer to your question requires further work
which is currently in progress.
We assure you that we are doing our best to send you a reply as soon as
possible and you can normally expect a reply within one month after
receiving this email.
Best regards,
COMP ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS
From: COMP ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS <[email address]>
Sent: Wednesday, September 13, 2023 5:25 PM
To: Christina GENNET <[FOI #12795 email]>
Cc: COMP ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS <[email address]>
Subject: RE: access to documents request - Travel expenses for officials
paid for by non-EU governments, organisations
Dear Ms Gennet,
I refer to your email of 11 September 2023, in which you submit a request
to receive the names of the officials that have been redacted from the
documents provided to you by the European Commission on 17 May 2023. In
this context, the first part of your request needs to be considered as a
confirmatory application in accordance with Article 7(2) of Regulation
1049/2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and
Commission documents[1] (hereafter Regulation 1049/2001).
I regret to inform you that your confirmatory application was lodged
outside the applicable deadline defined in Article 7(2) of Regulation
1049/2001. That Article provides that in the event of a total or partial
refusal, the applicant may, within 15 working days of receiving the
institution’s reply, make a confirmatory application asking the
institution to reconsider its position. Following the transmission of the
European Commission's reply on 17 May 2023, the applicable deadline for
lodging a confirmatory application ended on 9 June 2023.
Consequently, the Commission is not in a position to handle your
application.
As regards the second part of your request concerning the publication of
the cost of the expenses covered by law firms and consultancies and which
constitutes a new request, this will be handled as a request for
information under the Code of Good Administrative Behaviour and you can
expect a reply within 15 working days.
Yours sincerely,
ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS TEAM
European Commission
DG Competition
DG COMP.I.1 (Registry and Transparency)
[1][email address]
Dear Ms Gennet,
Please find in attachment a reply to your request for information of 11
September 2023.
Kind regards,
COMP ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS
From: COMP ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS
Sent: Monday, October 2, 2023 6:15 PM
To: Christina GENNET <[FOI #12795 email]>
Cc: COMP ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS <[email address]>
Subject: RE: access to documents request - Travel expenses for officials
paid for by non-EU governments, organisations
Dear Ms Gennet,
Unfortunately, we won’t be able to send you a reply within the time limit
mentioned below since the answer to your question requires further work
which is currently in progress.
We assure you that we are doing our best to send you a reply as soon as
possible and you can normally expect a reply within one month after
receiving this email.
Best regards,
COMP ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS
From: COMP ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS <[1][email address]>
Sent: Wednesday, September 13, 2023 5:25 PM
To: Christina GENNET <[2][FOI #12795 email]>
Cc: COMP ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS <[3][email address]>
Subject: RE: access to documents request - Travel expenses for officials
paid for by non-EU governments, organisations
Dear Ms Gennet,
I refer to your email of 11 September 2023, in which you submit a request
to receive the names of the officials that have been redacted from the
documents provided to you by the European Commission on 17 May 2023. In
this context, the first part of your request needs to be considered as a
confirmatory application in accordance with Article 7(2) of Regulation
1049/2001 regarding public access to European Parliament, Council and
Commission documents[1] (hereafter Regulation 1049/2001).
I regret to inform you that your confirmatory application was lodged
outside the applicable deadline defined in Article 7(2) of Regulation
1049/2001. That Article provides that in the event of a total or partial
refusal, the applicant may, within 15 working days of receiving the
institution’s reply, make a confirmatory application asking the
institution to reconsider its position. Following the transmission of the
European Commission's reply on 17 May 2023, the applicable deadline for
lodging a confirmatory application ended on 9 June 2023.
Consequently, the Commission is not in a position to handle your
application.
As regards the second part of your request concerning the publication of
the cost of the expenses covered by law firms and consultancies and which
constitutes a new request, this will be handled as a request for
information under the Code of Good Administrative Behaviour and you can
expect a reply within 15 working days.
Yours sincerely,
ACCESS TO DOCUMENTS TEAM
European Commission
DG Competition
DG COMP.I.1 (Registry and Transparency)
[4][email address]