The investigation into Equipo Economico, an office founded by former Finance Minister Cristóbal Montoro, has reopened the debate on the relationship that should exist between lobbies and politicians. Currently there is no state law that regulates the operation of interest or pressure groups, which makes the thin line that separates the work of lobbyists from influence peddling more blurred.
The case being followed in the Court of Instruction number 2 of Tarragona focuses on the alleged use by the Economic Team (EE) of its influence in the Treasury leadership, with Montoro as minister, to achieve legislative reforms in favor of its customers. What is the difference between this way of proceeding and the general way of lobbies? An executive of a consulting firm dedicated to supporting interest groups explains it: opacity. The function of a lobby is to promote laws or reforms in favor of a certain sector. To achieve this, they have a series of tools, including access to the legislator – through meetings with deputies – or the executive – with access to the different ministries in the field – to achieve their objective. The difference is that these movements to try to promote new legislation are done with light and stenographers.
Parliamentary sources are eager to know the background of what happened with EE, but what has emerged so far from the investigation is that they have managed to get the Treasury, in an opaque manner, to approve legislative reforms, for the particular interest of one or several companies. , and for what those responsible for the firm would have charged for their intermediation above the market, as suspected by the investigators led by the Anti-Corruption Prosecutor's Office.
“Clients did not pay so much for the content of the reports but for the supposed influence that members of the consultancy could have. The office offered the guarantee of achieving reform,” warns a lobbyist familiar with the way the US operates.
María Rosa Rotondo, president of the Association of Institutional Relations Professionals, is blunt when it comes to making the difference clear. "There is a radical difference between the activity that we carry out, which is to convey legitimate interests, represent opinions and collect and offer information, and those that are carried out in the dark and undoubtedly promote corruption." The lobbyist establishes the line that differentiates these two activities and which is none other than that marked by the crime of influence peddling included in the Penal Code. “For those who do not know the legal importance of the term prevailing, the border between lobbying and the crime of influence peddling could seem blurry. However, on several occasions the courts of law, both Spanish and European, have made the line between both concepts crystal clear,” she warns.
A parliamentarian explains what the relationship with the lobbies is like. A deputy must have the authorization of the parliamentary group before holding any meeting with representatives of interest groups. He maintains that relationships with them are important because they are the experts in the sector, those who are with reality. They seek to convince the deputies that the reform or proposal they propose is good for the sector. They do a job of explaining and convincing. And if they achieve it, in any case it will be the party that ultimately supports promoting it.
What you cannot do, explains a lobbyist, is pay for succulent lunches or dinners because then it could be understood as compensation. This is the case of Juan Bernardo Fuentes Curbelo, known as Tito Berni, involved in Operation Mediator and for which he is currently being investigated. According to judicial investigations, this former deputy for the Canary Islands received businessmen in Congress and then allowed himself to be invited to dinners with parties included.
This source explains that there are two ways to maintain contact. When a group directly accesses the parliamentary groups to do its work or when it is done through consulting firms that act as intermediaries between the lobby and the deputy and for what they charge. In recent years, several consulting firms have been making a name for themselves in the sector. Some, like Kreab, focus on strategic communication. While Acento, chaired by the former socialist minister José Blanco, and the former PP minister Alfonso Alonso and founded in 2019, is more focused on public affairs. Together with Llorente y Cuenca (LLC), they are the three consulting firms that lead the sector linked to public affairs in Spain.
But of course, both the parliamentary world and the lobbyist world are clear that these relationships must be regulated, as well as specify and define in more detail the revolving doors and limit the extent to which a member of the public administration can land in the private company on issues. which he directly dealt with in his previous position. “It does not mean prohibiting it because human capital and acquired knowledge must also be used, but rules of the game must be determined to avoid influence peddling and corruption,” acknowledges a former senior administration official.
In Spain, more than 10,000 regulations are approved each year at the state, regional and local level and it is necessary that there be relationships between the companies that know each sector and the administration. In just one year of the pandemic, 3,000 exceptional regulations were approved to combat Covid-19. Sources from the public administration emphasize that these links with the Government are legitimate and necessary because officials do not know the details of the functioning of the market and have to make correct regulatory decisions, "now they must be regulated in their proper channels and provided with transparency." .
Currently there are several registries such as the Transparency of the European Union, the Interest Representation or at the regional level such as the Interest Groups of the Parliament or the Generalitat of Catalonia, this being the first lobby registry created in Spain. The National Competition Market Commission (CNMC) was the first in the central administration to create a registry with the aim of regulating relations with associated companies.
In the last legislature, the PSOE tried to promote, although not with special zeal, a law to regulate lobbies but it finally fell on deaf ears with the call for early elections.
The legislative project on interest groups aims to provide “greater transparency” to the activities of public officials. Among its main contributions, “the new obligation to register in a registry.” His bill was admitted in May 2021 by the House but has since ended up in a drawer due to lack of understanding between parties.
This reform aims to add a new Title XIV to the Regulations of the Lower House with the name “On interest groups.” The purpose of this is to regulate the influence of these groups and their representatives in the agreements made by the Congress of Deputies. The proposal aims to approve a Code of Conduct and include violations for non-compliance.
