Lobbyists and interest representatives: How do the European Union institutions engage with lobbyists?

The European Parliament regularly receives enquiries from citizens about how the EU institutions deal with lobbyists and interest representatives.

The Treaty on European Union establishes that European Union (EU) institutions must have an open, transparent and regular dialogue with representative associations and civil society.

Transparency register

EU institutions interact with many people who represent specific interests, sometimes known as lobbyists. This is a legitimate and necessary part of the decision-making process, ensuring EU policies reflect society’s real needs. However, this process must be transparent. Transparency is one of the EU’skey principles and is important to maintain citizens’ trust.

Since 2021, the European Parliament, European Commission and Council share a common transparency register. This register lists ‘interest representatives’ (organisations, associations, groups and self-employed individuals) who try to influence the law-making and policy decisions of the EU institutions. It allows citizens to access information about lobbying activities in the institutions.

All interest representatives (lobbyists) are encouraged to register. However, registration is mandatory for certain activities, including access to the Parliament’s premises.

As of February 2024, close to 12 500 entities have been listed in the Transparency register. More than half are in-house lobbyists and trade associations and over a quarter are non-governmental organisations. For updated figures and more details, see the Transparency register statistics.

European Parliament calls for stricter rules to strengthen transparency

In the aftermath of ‘Qatargate’, the 2022 corruption scandal involving several Members of the European Parliament, Parliament adopted a resolution calling for stricter transparency rules. The text calls for the Transparency register to become fully mandatory and proposes setting up a special committee to identify any flaws in the European Parliament’s rules on transparency, integrity and corruption. Parliament has subsequently implemented a number of reforms to strengthen transparency.

Publication of meetings with lobby groups

• In the European Parliament, Members have to publish their scheduled meetings with lobby groups on the Parliament’s website.
• The European Commission’s high-level decision makers must publish lists of all meetings with lobby groups.

Further details on publications of meetings is available via the Transparency Register website.

Access to European Parliament premises

Organisations and individuals must be listed in the Transparency Register before requesting access (accreditation) to the European Parliament. However, registration in the Transparency Register does not mean that access is automatically granted. Further details on accreditation are available via the European Parliament website.

Further information

• Interinstitutional Agreement on a Transparency register, European Union, 2021
• EU Transparency Register, Briefing, European Parliamentary Research Service, 2023
• Article 7, Code of conduct for Members of the European Parliament regarding integrity and transparency, Rules of procedure of the European Parliament

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