Debate: Financial activities of the European Investment Bank - annual report  - Control of the financial activities of the European Investment Bank - annual report
Date: MONDAY, 5 JULY 2021
Speaker: Bas Eickhout
Country: France
Language: EN

I think if you read the reports, both in the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, where I was shadow, but also, of course, the Committee on Budgetary Control report, you do see that for the Parliament the EIB, the European Investment Bank, is a very important bank and it’s the largest multinational investment bank that we have. And we very much also welcome the role that, for example, the EIB played in the famous Juncker investment plan. 2019, it always feels a bit awkward to be very honest, to do a budget control of 2019 when we are already halfway to 2021. But that was an important year because that was also the year where the EIB announced to become the Climate Bank of Europe, and being a Green at the same time, I can only welcome that, of course. But as we also see with the Green Deal, ambition is one thing, but now we have to put it into practice and put it into action.  And there are, of course, still some critical questions to be asked. For example if you look at the absolute emissions that are linked to the projects that the EIB is financing, the emissions rose from 2019 compared to 2018, and there was still a finance of EUR 685 million into gas projects.  We know that the energy lending policies have been changed, but still, we would like to hear also from President Hoyer on how are you going to make sure that this phase-out of gas projects is going to be put forward. Also, given the concerns we are still having if you look into projects like Trans-Anatolia or Trans-Adriatic, these big gas pipeline projects. And also there I would be very much interested to hear from President Hoyer how the EIB is going to look at the issues of a fossil lock-in, because if we want to go into a future of decarbonisation, then a lock-in into any other fossil fuel is not what we want to do. And I’m sure we agree on that, but I would like to see some vision on the part of the EIB to work on that.  The same is also on the lack of transparency about emissions that are being financed via intermediaries. So you have the direct parties, of course, but you also have the intermediaries that are financed through EIB and are causing emissions. And we would like to see more transparency of that as well, so that we are having a full footprint analysis of the EIB and not only through direct. Looking at what the EIB has been doing, we very much compliment what you have been doing on the revision of the energy-lending policies, the climate roadmap, the upcoming transport policies, reform where – at least if we are not mistaken – the EIB will announce also to stop airport expansion, but it would be good to reiterate that of course once more.  But also here, I think it is very important that we also look at the counterpart framework of the EIB again to make sure that there are decarbonisation targets for the EIB clients and intermediaries again. So I would be interested to hear from President Hoyer on that as well. Not only is the EIB a climate bank, it also portrays itself as a development bank, so a role  outside the EU. But there we really still would like to see the point that there is a concern of violation of human rights and really effective complaint mechanisms, and what is the EIB going to do about that in order to make sure that that is being improved?  This is also probably a question towards the Commission. Also within the EIB, we have, of course, a discussion on grants versus loans towards developing countries. And you will not be surprised that for some developing countries, it’s not the loans that work, it should be grants, and there I think also the Commission should have a say if we look at what the EIB is doing. I think where we are most critical is on the governance issues, staff issues governance. So I think we do have to address that also here in this plenary, and we really would like to hear a good reply of President Hoyer on that. There are on a couple of issues. First of all, on the conflicts of interest, I think the Parliament has reiterated a couple of times that we are concerned that vice-presidents sometimes are being in charge of their own home country. And we sincerely think that here there should be – I’m talking about vice-presidents in the management committee, right – so that they are responsible for their home country. What is the EIB going to do to make sure that there is not a conflict of interest, are there ideas of cooling-off periods, etc.? Here, really, we need a better approach of the EIB, and I’m sure that that colleagues of mine will raise that issue as well. I see some already nodding.  And then, of course, the staff issues. There have been some serious cases of harassment and I have to be honest here to say that the initial reply of the EIB could have been better. And I know that some of my colleagues will mention that as well, but any harassment case is serious and any harassment case should be prevented. And how is the EIB going to deal with that? Because I do think that any proportionate action needs to be taken and only written warnings is not sufficient. So really here we would like to hear a reply of President Hoyer how to address that, also because of the importance of the EIB. And this is a good development that the EIB is playing a more and more important role, but that also means that the scrutiny is more serious, and I think there also the EIB has to adhere to.  Last point is towards the Commission. You thought you could lay back there, but there is of course still the role of the Commission that is not very accountable towards the Parliament, and this is especially through Article 19 opinions, where we do not know necessarily what position the Commission is taking when the EIB is deciding. And the position of the Commission can be very important there. So we want more transparency on the position that the EIB is taking in management decisions by the EIB. I would be very much to looking forward to your reply on that.  I think those are some of the important points.