Notices by Corporate Europe Observatory (corporateeurope@mstdn.social)

We need #RulestoProtect not #Deregulation.

🇪🇺 Commission needs to stop doing bidding of big business & get back to regulating in public interest.
If you support our work to challenge this agenda, get our newsletter: https://www.corporateeurope.org/en/newsletter

Thanks again to Ralph Underhill!

There have also been numerous so-called “reality checks” which feed into the #deregulation #Omnibus process.

But these 🇪🇺 Commission “reality checks” are pseudo consultations, dominated by industry, and operating on ridiculously short timelines.

https://www.corporateeurope.org/en/2025/07/crash-course-eus-deregulation-wave

And the 🇪🇺 Commission looks set to continue its turbo-charged #deregulation agenda.

There are rumours of more omnibuses, while other much-needed rules in the pipeline now look as it they will be substantially weakened, for example on #PFAS or #REACH reform .

https://www.euobserver.com/health-and-society/ar4545905d

The 🇪🇺 Commission is taking a political chainsaw to hard won social, environmental, and digital protections.
We need #RulestoProtect not #Deregulation.

Check out our new cartoons below by Ralph Underhill and spread the word!

The 🇪🇺 Commission & industry both like to talk about “simplification” of EU laws. Other favourite phrases include “streamlining” or “cutting red tape”.

But let’s be clear: it’s cutting social, green, & digital protections.
See more at #Deregulation
Watch: https://www.corporateeurope.org/en/deregulation-watch

The #deregulation chainsaw is being wielded in several ways
10 omnibuses (so far) have been announced by 🇪🇺 Commission
🌍 Sustainability
🧪 Chemicals
🐝 Pesticides
🌐 Digital
🚜 Agri
💥 Defence
🏭 Pollution
These rules are under attack
See #Omnibus :
tracker:
https://cloud.corporateeurope.org/s/RjrwKPiTmmZM5BG?dir=/&editing=false&openfile=true

🎁 Just before the holidays, the European Commission granted Big Tech its Christmas wish-list: an unprecedented attack on our digital rights.
Together with LobbyControl, we analysed the proposed Digital Omnibus and mapped how closely it aligns with Big Tech’s lobbying demands. The result is alarming: what’s being framed as “cutting red tape” is actually about cutting rights.

👉 https://www.corporateeurope.org/en/2026/01/article-article-how-big-tech-shaped-eus-roll-back-digital-rights

🍿Last chance to catch the European premiere of CEO’s documentary “The Scramble for Hydrogen in South Africa” featuring the voices and stories of some of the most affected communities in South Africa that are being ignored by EU politicians.

📅 When: 27 Nov
📍 Where: Cinema Vendôme, Ixelles, Brussels
Register now: https://corporateeurope.org/en/event/4

The EU plans to import vast quantities of green hydrogen from South Africa. But indigenous and marginalised communities have barely been consulted on hydrogen production projects that can radically affect their health and livelihoods.

📣 BREAKING: One out of every 25 attendees walking around the #COP30 climate talks is a fossil fuel lobbyist.

New research from #KickBigPollutersOut reveals there are more than 1,600 in the UN negotiations in Brazil.

Here's a thread with the top findings 🧵
https://www.kickbigpollutersout.org/Release-Kick-Out-The-Suits-COP30

🚨New report

📝 Behind closed doors, Big Tech is writing the standards that will govern their own AI systems

❌ The EU should not outsource public policy-making on fundamental rights to private bodies

👉 https://corporateeurope.org/en/2025/01/bias-baked

🧵

🤑 It seems straighforward that big polluters shouldn't be allowed to write the rules of climate action or use COP partnerships to cover up their role in fuelling the climate crisis.

More info: https://kickbigpollutersout.org/COP29FossilFuelLobbyists

#kickbigpollutersout

🌍 That's why #KickBigPollutersOut - a coalition of over 450 organisations - is demanding that @UNFCCC and world governments stop fossil fuel interests from undermining climate action at #COP29.

Join our campaign: https://kickbigpollutersout.org/COP29FossilFuelLobbyists

🚨 Breaking!
🕴️Today we uncover that there are more than 1770 fossil fuel lobbyists are attending #COP29 - more than delegates from all climate vulnerable nations combined.

Read all about it here: https://corporateeurope.org/en/2024/11/fossil-fuel-lobbyists-eclipse-delegations-most-climate-vulnerable-nations-cop29-climate

#kickbigpollutersout

🤯 What HyCOPrisy!

Our new investigation shows how the EU is using #COP29 to greenwash Azerbaijan’s gas as sustainable - so it can pretend to be a climate leader while doubling its gas imports from the country.

🧵A thread on the key findings
https://corporateeurope.org/en/2024/11/cop29-hycoprisy-0

🔎 docs show the EU persuaded Azerbaijan + its oil co. SOCAR to join its voluntary Global Methane Pledge, offering to co-organise prestigious high-level events with them so they could tell their “great energy story”

Big Tech has been making use of an extremely insidious and shady lobby tactic: the use of front groups.

Find out more about our most recent report with @somo and @lobbycontrol in the video and read all about it here:

https://corporateeurope.org/en/2024/10/uncovering-big-techs-hidden-network

🚨The lobby group Allied for Startups
has been inviting Members of the @euparliament to its “VIP Policy Dinner” this evening.

Allied for Startups is a Big Tech front group.

🚪MEPs should not open the door to Big Tech’s shady lobbying tactics.

A thread 👇

Allied for Startups is funded by Big Tech donors including Amazon, Google, Microsoft and Apple.

🔎In a leaked lobby strategy document from 2020, Google mentions Allied for Startups as a key ally to echo its messages on the DSA and the DMA

https://corporateeurope.org/en/2021/08/lobby-network-big-techs-web-influence-eu

Some employees have direct links to Big Tech.

👥An Allied for Startups’ senior advisor is also working for Amazon and Google with his lobby firm Leading Edge Global Communications

Another Google lobbyist was part of Allied for Startup’s daily management until 2023

📬With @lobbycontrol we have filed a complaint with the EU lobby register against Allied for Startups for underestimating its lobby budget

While Allied for Startups in 2022 had total expenses of €750.000 it only reported a lobby budget of €199.999

https://www.lobbyfacts.eu/datacard/allied-for-startups?rid=634665118544-37