Yesterday I was contacted by an aspiring young lobbyist. It became a rather epic phone conversation.
After the first misunderstanding due to bad phone lines on his behalf, it transpired he represented two organisations with a rather tarnished image: FIFA and Johnson & Johnson, hired by the latter. These two organisations have identified it is in their core business‘ interest to work together in a lobby effort aimed at the European Parliament.
Personally I would have thought they’d be better of doing something that would raise their image, but nope they prefer to belittle the MEP community in Brussels.
He called very kindly to invite us to an event Johnson & Johnson and FIFA was organising at the Parliament in the near future. Only I work for a Pirate Party MEP and worthy and important as health issues are our main concern are issues like preserved civic liberties on-line and reformed copyright. So I asked him how the analyses looked like when they identified us as interesting to this event? Of course, he couldn’t answer, no surprise there.
Then came the best of all – but if the event is of no interest to your MEP maybe he would like to attend the cocktail we are hosting the evening before the event?
In other words: MEP’s are so easy to lure and so eager to be schmooze they will turn up to any event.
Let me say this – you want us supporting your cause, telling us we are a cheap date and easy to buy isn’t the way to get it.
Swede in Paris - Svenska i Paris 
To be honest I think you were approached by somebody both inexperienced and ill-prepared. I would almost think an intern. A lobbyist with some standard and experience would find calling an irrelevant MEP not only a waste of your time, but also his own..
GillaGilla
I don’t criticise the person in question. But I do think that companies like Johnson&Johnson and FIFA would get this right?
GillaGilla
I see Sara´s point and knowing her I know that it comes from a very good place. However, I ´d be tempted to say that my approach to life, of which politics is just one facet, is more to be open-minded.
I wouldn´t have minded the invitation on the assumption that it was a cheap-date kind of approach! And connecting to people, even unrelated one, is almost always an enriching experience not a waste of time.
But maybe that is why I am no lobbyist or MEP either! 🙂
F
GillaGilla
Of the 2 Swedish Pirate Party MEPs in the EP, one sits on the industry committee, the other sits on the consumer protection committee. Maybe the lobbyist was naive enough to think Pirate Party MEPs, democratically elected as they are, would have a more than passing interest in health issues – no doubt a major concern for their own constituents – particularly if one sits on the Consumer Protection committee.
Oh, and as for ”MEP’s are so easy to lure and so eager to be schmooze they will turn up to any event”…yep, you said it.
GillaGilla
A very valid point and if the invitation had been about anything like that, or concerning one of our current issues, the response would have been different. Only we were invited to see and touch the FIFA cup.
GillaGilla
do you want to make a fortune very fast ?
buy a MEP at the price it costs and sell it at the price it evaluates himself 🙂
GillaGilla