[ 2014-02-04 ]

Corruption across EU 'breathtaking'
The extent of corruption in Europe is
"breathtaking" and it costs the EU economy at
least 120bn euros (£99bn) annually, the European
Commission says.

EU Home Affairs Commissioner Cecilia Malmstroem
has presented a full report on the problem.

She said the true cost of corruption was "probably
much higher" than 120bn.

Three-quarters of Europeans surveyed for the
Commission study said that corruption was
widespread, and more than half said the level had
increased.

"The extent of the problem in Europe is
breathtaking, although Sweden is among the
countries with the least problems," Ms Malmstroem
wrote in Sweden's Goeteborgs-Posten daily.

The cost to the EU economy is equivalent to the
bloc's annual budget.

For the report the Commission studied corruption
in all 28 EU member states. The Commission says it
is the first time it has done such a survey.

Bribery widespread

National governments, rather than EU institutions,
are chiefly responsible for fighting corruption in
the EU.

But Ms Malmstroem said national governments and
the European Parliament had asked the Commission
to carry out the EU-wide study. The Commission
drafts EU laws and enforces compliance with EU
treaties.

In the UK only five people out of 1,115 - less
than 1% - said they had been expected to pay a
bribe. It was "the best result in all Europe", the
report said.

But 64% of British respondents said they believed
corruption to be widespread in the UK, while the
EU average was 74% on that question.

In some countries there was a relatively high
number reporting personal experience of bribery.

In Croatia, the Czech Republic, Lithuania,
Bulgaria, Romania and Greece, between 6% and 29%
of respondents said they had been asked for a
bribe, or had been expected to pay one, in the
past 12 months.

There were also high levels of bribery in Poland
(15%), Slovakia (14%) and Hungary (13%), where the
most prevalent instances were in healthcare.

Ms Malmstroem said corruption was eroding trust in
democracy and draining resources from the legal
economy.

"The political commitment to really root out
corruption seems to be missing," she complained.

The EU has an anti-fraud agency, Olaf, which
focuses on fraud and corruption affecting the EU
budget, but it has limited resources. In 2011 its
budget was just 23.5m euros.

The Commission highlighted that:

Public procurement (public bodies buying goods and
services) forms about one-fifth of the EU's total
output (GDP) and is vulnerable to corruption, so
better controls and integrity standards are
needed
Corruption risks are generally greater at local
and regional level
Many shortcomings remain in financing of political
parties - often codes of conduct are not tough
enough
Often the existing rules on conflicts of interest
are inadequately enforced
The quality of corruption investigations varies
widely across the EU
Swedish model

The EU study includes two major opinion polls by
Eurobarometer, the Commission's polling service.

Four out of 10 of the businesses surveyed
described corruption as an obstacle to doing
business in Europe.

Sweden "is undoubtedly one of the countries with
the least problems with corruption, and other EU
countries should learn from Sweden's solutions for
dealing with the problem", Ms Malmstroem said,
pointing to the role of laws on transparency and
openness.

Organised crime groups have sophisticated networks
across Europe and the EU police agency Europol
says there are at least 3,000 of them.

Bulgaria, Romania and Italy are particular
hotspots for organised crime gangs in the EU, but
white-collar crimes like bribery and VAT (sales
tax) fraud plague many EU countries.

Last year Europol director Rob Wainwright said VAT
fraud in the carbon credits market had cost the EU
about 5bn euros.

Source - BBC

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