Alliance for Lobbying Transparency and Ethics Regulation (Alter-EU)

As a candidate I have received an email. One asking me to sign up to a pledge about lobbying in Brussels. You know the sort of thing, yah boo! to corporate interests and so on.

The Alliance for Lobbying Transparency and Ethics Regulation (Alter-EU), the European Attac network, the Seattle to Brussels Network (S2B), and the European Coalition for Corporate Justice (ECCJ) - together representing more than 400 European civil society organisations - believe that Europe needs strong Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) to stop corporate interests dominating EU policy-making.

I’m no great fan of such corporate pork to be sure, so I have a look at their website. Hmm, yes, certainly I want a full scale rethink of the EU’s free trade policy. I think we should have one for example, rather than this Zollverein which we actually have.

But that isn’t what they’re suggesting of course. For the whole thing is being run by Friends of the Earth Europe. Those who get the vapours over anyone trading with anyone else not within walking distance.

Erm, yes, the people asking me to sign up to accountability in lobbying in Brussels are those people who get half their income from the Commission to lobby the Commission.

I think this might be an opportunity to Just Say No, don’t you?