MEPs say safeguards against industry dominance "insufficient”

Approximately two-thirds of the 1,000 expert groups are made up solely of member states’ representatives. Members of the European Parliament point out that the corporate sector is over-represented in the remainder compared to civil society and small and medium sized enterprises. Last summer, representatives of the Alliance for Lobbying Transparency and Ethics Regulation (ALTER-EU) met with the cabinet of Michel Barnier, the Commissioner for Internal Market and Services, to alert them that 191 corporate lobbyists sit in a personal capacity in eight expert groups on financial services. No information was provided by Barnier's cabinet about the evolution of this situation – mostly inherited from Charlie McCreevy.