European Parliament’s scheduling fiasco risks delaying commissioner hearings

BRUSSELS — There’s no escaping bureaucracy, even when you are trying to put together a European Commission.
Complex calendars and lengthy conflict of interest screenings for commissioner nominees have dashed hopes for a November launch.
Now, the start date of the new Commission is likely to be delayed until the beginning of December, eight EU lawmakers, parliamentary officials and European diplomats told POLITICO. 
The complicated inner workings of the European Parliament’s scheduling have been a rude awakening for Brussels bureaucrats returning from summer holidays, with the start of the next Commission now nearing Christmas, the officials said.
The European Parliament seems in no rush to sign off on the next group of European commissioners, or to push them to start work on key portfolios such as competition, defense and trade even as Russia’s war in Ukraine and the nearing U.S. election require the EU executive’s work to continue. 
The original slate of hearings expected for late September was “overly optimistic,” said one senior parliamentary official, who, like the others quoted in the story, was granted anonymity to speak freely. 
The official pointed out delays were due, in part, to the Parliament’s complicated travel calendar (MEPs are set to go to Strasbourg for the last week of September and two weeks of October).
The hearings usually take place in Brussels and relocating them to Strasbourg would be a logistical nightmare, the senior official pointed out.
“There is no rush,” the official added, arguing that both the Parliament and the nominees will benefit from extra time. “The nominees want as many days as possible to prepare.”
The likely delay is yet another setback for European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who is struggling to achieve her goal of a gender-balanced institution. So far, there are only 9 female nominees and many EU capitals are resisting pressure to change their male nominees for female ones. Earlier this week, for example, the Slovenian government publicly reiterated that Tomaž Vesel would remain Ljubljana’s pick.
Eric Mamer, the chief spokesperson of the European Commission, said that “it is for the European Parliament to set the schedule for the hearings.”
After the European Parliament election in early June, Brussels hoped the new Commission would be up and running as soon as possible.
Setting up a new Commission is always a timely and cumbersome process, as the different European capitals have to send their nominees to von der Leyen, who is now divvying up portfolios between candidates. Still, the hope was to get the new Commission in place on November 1, just ahead of the U.S. election.
But that timing now seems virtually impossible as every commissioner bar von der Leyen needs to face an hours-long grilling by MEPs, and those hearings aren’t likely to begin until mid-October. Parliament initially hoped to hold the hearings at the end of September.
That means the final confirmation vote on the entire Commission wouldn’t take place until the Parliament plenary session in the last week of November, pushing the kick-off date to December in a best-case scenario. 
And that’s without taking into account the European Parliament voting down one or more commissioners. If a candidate (or candidates) is rejected, the country in question has to send an alternative, who has to face their own grilling in the Parliament.
The next step is von der Leyen presenting her new team and their portfolios to the Parliament’s leadership, which is penciled in for September 11. Only then will the European Parliament pick the dates for the hearings. 
Delphine Colard, deputy spokesperson of the European Parliament, said that “the Parliament is ready to start the process of the hearings as soon as President von der Leyen presents the structure and portfolios proposed.”
That process is complicated. Once the list of commissioners is confirmed, the Parliament’s legal affairs committee (known as JURI) needs to screen their financial declarations, looking for potential conflicts of interest. If a potential problem is discovered, the candidate can be called for a separate hearing and members of the committee can say no to a nominee.
“Given that this is a scrutiny task, given the conflict of interest, given that citizens will hold us to account if we are sloppy, then it does make sense that we have sufficient time,” said René Repasi, head of the German Socialist delegation and a member of the legal affairs committee. 
“The old schedule that was discussed seemed over-ambitious to me with a risk that the first phase [conflict of interest screening] would be too superficial,” he added. 
Repasi, who said he also initially expected to start the hearings by the end of September, acknowledged that the Parliament will need to start them later. “It is an impossible task [to start before],” he said.
Once the legal affairs committee is done, the other committees take over. They will send written questions to the nominees, who will send answers that form the basis of the in-person grillings. 
“You know the European Parliament. Their calendar is the holy grail,” said one of the officials. 
Camille Gijs and Stuart Lau contributed reporting.