Pages

▼

Saturday, 10 December 2022

And Still Nobody Is Surprised



EU vice-president and Greek socialist MEP Eva Kaili is ARRESTED by Belgian police in 'Qatar lobbying scandal': Politician is suspended from her party amid corruption claims

Ms Kaili is a member of the Panhellenic Socialist Movement and was voted in as one of 14 vice-presidents in January 2022. She has been an MEP since 2014.


The BBC adds this snippet.

The day of the arrests, 9 December, is international anti-corruption day, designated by the UN and also marked by the European Parliament.

Corruption costs the EU economy between €179bn and €990bn a year, representing up to 6% of EU GDP in lost tax revenue and investment, according to a 2016 estimate cited in a document published by the European Parliament to mark the day.

And still nobody is surprised.
at

6 comments:

  1. DiscoveredJoys10 December 2022 at 11:57

    Corruption is is bad not because of the impact on society, but because the EU countries cannot tax it. Not exactly a good moral justification.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Sam Vega10 December 2022 at 23:30

    I hope the EU is monitoring the levels of corruption in its constituent member states. It would be a violation of their core principles if some countries were allowed to systematically benefit from corruption more than others.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Tammly11 December 2022 at 12:08

    I understand France is no slouch when it comes to the race for corruption, especially round the coastal regions.

    ReplyDelete
  4. A K Haart11 December 2022 at 15:34

    DJ - no it isn't a good moral justification. They seem comfortable with petty corruption though, as if concerned that big corruption scandals might endanger their smaller scams.

    Sam - good point, a level playing-field for scams should be their prime objective.

    Tammly - and Spain from what I hear.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Peter MacFarlane12 December 2022 at 10:00

    "Corruption costs the EU economy between €179bn and €990bn a year..."

    Not convinced.

    The EU loses the money, sure, but somebody gets the money instead, and I bet they do more productive and useful things with it than the EU would have done.

    Also, what DJ said.

    ReplyDelete
  6. A K Haart12 December 2022 at 14:42

    Peter - yes, it's impossible to imagine the EU making productive use of the money.

    ReplyDelete

Due to spam comments and now the UK Online Safety Act, comment moderation is on.
Anonymous or impolite comments or comments likely to be flagged by the system are liable to be treated as spam.