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The contracts of the European Commission with the consulting firms PWC, Deloitte, EY and KPMG, the so-called Big Four, rose further last year and, according to estimates by EURACTIV, exceeded 156 million euros, partly due to the reform funding program.

The Commission updated its financial transparency system on Tuesday (29 June) with the 2020 figures.

The effects of the worst recession since World War II did not limit the Commission’s spending on third parties last year, rather the opposite.

The contracts with the Big Four in 2020 had a volume of at least 156 million euros, of which 101 million euros had been spent up to December.

In 2019, the contracts concluded with these companies amounted to 125 million euros, of which 102 million euros were paid this year.

The Commission stated that the difference between the two figures was due to the time between the time the contract was signed and the actual payment. Some contracts run for several years.

In the past two years, Deloitte has received the largest amount of EU funding among the Big Four, winning contracts worth € 53 million in 2020 and € 57 million in 2019.

Deloitte did not respond to EURACTIV’s request for comment on this story.

In recent years, the Commission has spent increasing amounts of money on outside contractors, particularly the Big Four, after the EU executive launched the Structural Reform Support Program in 2017.

This tool provides technical assistance to Member States in designing structural reforms, either through the Commission’s in-house expertise or through experts recruited with EU funding from international organizations, NGOs or private companies.

Since the program began, the Big Four have increased their slice of the pie, attracting more than a third of the funding allocated to the instrument over the past year. They received projects worth around 28 million euros out of a total of 75 million euros, which the Directorate-General for Structural Reform Support spent in 2020.

In 2019, they received € 24 million to support reforms, just under a third of the € 79 million spent on the entire program this year.

The Commission’s advisory bills are likely to increase further in the coming years. The Technical Assistance Instrument, the successor to the Structural Reform Support Program, will receive a total of € 864 million for the period 2021-2027, around € 115 million per year.

The Commission said that more than 60% of the support requested by Member States for reforms in national reconstruction plans in 2021 will be for access to the EU’s Reconstruction and Resilience Fund.

The updated figures for the past year corresponded to the first full year of office of Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. Before taking office, the German Bundestag examined lucrative contracts that were awarded during her tenure in the state’s Ministry of Defense.

But the sizeable resources the commission spent on consultants began before it became commission head.

EURACTIV announced in March that the EU executive had awarded contracts worth 462 million euros to PWC, Deloitte, EY and KPMG between 2016 and 2019 alone.

Following these revelations, a group of 73 MPs sent a letter to von der Leyen and the Executive Vice-President of the Commission, Valdis Dombrovskis, expressing their concern.

In the letter, MEPs from all walks of life questioned the involvement of advisers in the structural reform support program, particularly in sensitive areas covered by funded projects, including the labor market or the judiciary.

In the reply sent on 11 June and seen by EURACTIV, Dombrovskis defended the role of adviser in the Commission’s reform program.

He argued that external contractors “are intended to provide the beneficiary Member State with the best and most tailor-made solution in the most economically advantageous way”.

He noted that contracts are awarded through public procurement and that contractors are not involved in policy making but instead provide “knowledge and intellectual services / advisory services”.

“When a task is temporary in nature or requires a rapidly evolving skill – especially in relation to IT development – using outside expertise is a good option to bring in the skills required for a time-bound exercise in a particular field,” added he added.

In the documents attached to the letter, the Commission stated that between 2016 and 2020 it had spent EUR 542 million on study contracts awarded to external companies, including executive agencies.

Philippe Lamberts, Co-President of the Greens in Parliament and supporter of the letter, told EURACTIV that he was “not satisfied” with the Commission’s response.

“I’m not buying the efficiency argument,” he said. “We are not talking about catering services, this is the core business of the Commission,” he added.

Lamberts emphasized that it was not a question of whether the contracts concluded with external consultants were legal, but whether there was “democratic legitimacy” to “sell” public tasks to private contractors.

The Green MEP warned of the risk of conflict of interest as the European The ombudsman is featured on behalf of the commission to BlackRock. The world’s largest asset manager has been tasked with examining the integration of environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals into EU banking regulations.

[Edited by Josie Le Blond]