EU politicians vote for tough oil, gas anti-corruption law

Oil majors and other resource firms have said they believe in transparency and have already signed up to international guidelines enshrined in the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative.

But some have complained that the European Parliament’s insistence on project-by-project reporting, as opposed to reporting at government level, is unnecessary and impractical, and have also taken issue with the payment threshold.

Arlene McCarthy, a British Labour member of the European Parliament who led the discussions in the assembly, said it had stood firm against industry lobbying.

“We have not given in to the pressure of industry and government lobbying for a weak transparency regime. We are insisting on project-by-project reporting with a low threshold,” she said in a statement.

“Project-level disclosure is the only way in which local communities in resource-rich countries are able to expose corruption and hold their governments accountable for using revenues towards development.”

Others who have lent their voice to the call for a strong stance include Kofi Annan, the former U.N. secretary general who last week cited the example of labour unrest sweeping South Africa’s platinum belt as an added reason to crack down on corruption.

“The recent violence at the Marikana mine in South Africa shows what happens when trust is in short supply at the local level,” he wrote in an opinion piece published in the New York Times.