BRUSSELS - The European Commission spent €542.4 million between 2016 and 2020 for studies written by external private contractors.
The findings are part of a larger probe into how large consultancies are increasingly landing lucrative contracts, amid questions on possible conflicts of interest.
MEP budget sleuths will on 6 December grill the European Commission for handing out increasingly-lucrative contracts, worth hundreds of millions of euros, to large consultancy firms.
Among those are PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC), KPMG, Deloitte and EY - also known as the 'Big Four'.
