A few years ago, over a rather boozy dinner, a friend working in the Commission spokesman’s service told me that they have an internal list of names of officially accredited journalists who have – legitimately – been paid by the Commission directly, or indirectly, to write brochures or provide ‘media trainings’ for the EU institutions.

I asked what the purpose of the list was, and my friend commented drunkenly ‘…don’t really know but could be useful someday…’

For many journalists, it is common to do this type of work to augment salaries.