New Code of Conduct for Commissioners
On 31 January the European Commission adopted a new code of conduct for members of the European Commission. This introduces important improvements, addressing our recommendations voiced in two studies for the European Parliament’s Committee on Budgetary Control in 2009 and 2014 (published here: http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/STUD/2014/490697/IPOL_STU(2014)490697_EN.pdf and http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/etudes/join/2009/411268/IPOL-JOIN_ET(2009)411268_EN.pdf). Whilst the revised code of conduct can be considered a significant improvement compared with its previous iterations, there remains room for further improvement, most notably with regard to strengthening the personal-responsibility dimension of members of the Commission, e.g. via capacity development on integrity. Moreover, several of the recommendations noted in the European Parliament studies have only been addressed partially.