Published on: 1 June 2022
Read the full article here: https://www.access-info.org/2022-06-01/eu-company-ownership-consultation/
Madrid, 1 June 2022 – Under the EU’s Open Data Directive, company registration and ownership information should be available as open data. In a surprise move, the European Commission is now proposing, via a long-overdue Implementing Regulation, that the names of the owners of companies will not be made available for free.
As a result, SMEs, businesses, academia, journalists and CSOs will not get access to information that is vital in due diligence, innovation and preventing corruption, money laundering and terrorist financing.
Campaign body Access-Info says: "It is now of great concern that, following long delays, the European Commission has published a proposed Implementing Regulation, which significantly limits which data about company owners will be made public, in effect undermining the transparency commitment made by the EU Member States and European Parliament."
Jaya Chakrabarti, CEO of TISCreport comments: "It is vital that company owners' names are made public, not least because critical sanctions legislation requires organisations to ensure they are not in breach of financial and other sanctions put in place by their own governments. The public purse already pays for the creation of such records in one way or another. Corporates and citizens must be enabled to comply with the law without financial barriers."
They, and open data activists, are particularly concerned that the proposed Implementing Regulation calls for a bare minimum of company data and documents to be published but excludes the names of company owners. If this Implementing Regulation is adopted as is, the Member States which currently charge for access to their company registers will not have to make the names of company owners available for free. Interestingly, those who can afford to pay – with prices ranging up to €15 per record – are able to access this data. This demonstrates that the problem is not one of personal data protection but rather more of limiting public scrutiny. In the UK, Companies House, which administers company records published under the UK Companies Act, demonstrates that public records can be financed by charging modest sums to corporate bodies submitting updated records annually. The cost of adminstering the data should not have to be borne by the tax-paying public.
There is a public consultation to respond to. The public have until 21 June 2022 to give feedback. To offer guidance on how to give feedback, a group of leading transparency and open data activists will be holding a public briefing to discuss how best to respond to this consultation to call on the Commission to truly make EU company ownership transparent.
Join leading transparency and open data activists in a public briefing to discuss next steps and how to best respond to the public consultation.
When: Tuesday 7 June, 16.30 – 17.30 CEST
Where: Zoom, register here
We will definitely be there. We hope you will be there too. #NoAccountabilityWithoutTransparency
