Anti-smoking campaigners have hailed Emily O’Reilly, the European Ombudsman, as a champion of transparency after she branded the European Commission’s record on disclosing meetings with tobacco lobbyists as “inadequate, unreliable and unsatisfactory”.
Ms O’Reilly, the former Irish Ombudsman, criticised the commission for not following UN rules to ensure public access to details of any discussions with tobacco companies or their representatives.
An investigation carried out by her office found that only the Directorate General for Health complied with best practice and criticised the approach of the commission under José Manuel Barroso, its former president.
In most cases, the EU body only published records of talks with tobacco representatives following freedom of information requests or in response to questions from MEPs — an approach that Ms