Brussels, 21/04/2010 (Agence Europe) - On Wednesday 21 April, the European Parliament debated the reports on granting a discharge to the Community institutions for the execution of the 2008 budget. Voting will take place on 5 or 6 May, in Brussels. The most controversial report is the one by Ryszard Czarnecki (ECR, Poland), which proposes that the discharge for the Council budget be postponed (EUROPE 10105).
According to the Lisbon Treaty, member states are jointly responsible for the execution of the budget, pointed out German Social Democrat Jens Geier, the rapporteur for the general Commission budget. Geier wants a better balance between the annual budgets and the multi-annual programmes. He is highlighting certain priorities: cohesion, and, therefore, money from structural funds, accession futures, the external service, but also mechanisms that will allow better management and better recovery.
Spanish Socialist Inés Ayala Sender, rapporteur for European Development Funds (EDF), is afraid that development aid could be negatively affected: the EDF should be fully integrated into the general budget, in an effort to ensure transparency and good management. She also asserted that the 10th EDF should focus on certain sectors so as to avoid, “the perverse effects of proliferation and dangers to the efficiency of the NGOs”. Ms Ayala deplores the fact that the European Court of Auditors has not been able to have access to documents involving a certain number of payments made within the context of cooperation with international organisations.
The report by Bart Staes (Greens /EFA, Belgium) on the EP budget discharge had a bumpy ride (EUROPE 10104) and was subject to significant change due to the scrapping of around 50 points in its resolution. Staes is recommending that the discharge be given on the execution of the EP budget because, “no major fault occurred or any embezzlement or scandal”. Nonetheless, “my report remains critical” and more transparency and responsibility is desirable, explained the MEP. Staes admitted that there had been significant progress with regard to the status of officials and assistance, the critical analysis of buildings, energy consumption reduction (-25%), CO2 emissions (-17%) and waste (-50%).
There was no criticism of the budget for the Committee of the Regions and the Ombudsman and very little to say with regard to the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC) and the European Court of Auditors (Even if the way it functions could be improved by reducing the number of members who work for it), confirmed Ryszard Czarnecki: it is the Council budget, which is causing problems and it is for this reason that the rapporteur has asked for a referral on the discharge to made. He makes a lot of critical comments in this regard: unclear invoices, irregularities in the calls for tender and responses that did not correspond to requests made etc.
The scale of the Community agencies' budget has significantly increased, pointed out rapporteur Véronique Mathieu (EPP, France). She noted a number of recurrent problems: shortcomings in the procedure for awarding contracts, unrealistic recruitment plans and the lack of precise objectives in programming etc. She is proposing that the discharge for the European Police College is subject to referral because she observed “blatant irregularities”. She did, however, praise the agencies which, on their own initiative had gone even further in their efforts to improve their management: the EFSA, the European Environment Agency and the European Fund for Improving Living Conditions and Work.
Speaking on behalf of the EPP group, Ville Itälä from Finland said that she agreed with Bart Staes: the money used by the institutions, “does not belong to us, it belongs to the taxpayers” and this requires greater effort to improve simplicity and transparency. Mr Itälä mentioned a number of problems arising during the sessions in Strasbourg, even a number of problems that arise during normal circumstances, “I need a whole day for getting back to my house”, he said. Speaking on behalf of the S&D group, Edit Herczog from Hungary stated, “we have a legal responsibility when using the budget on the behalf of citizens”. She acknowledged that the internal audit would never be perfect and that sufficient controls would therefore be necessary. Gerben-Jan Gerbrandy (ALDE, the Netherlands) said that he was a fan of the group Genesis and their song, “Dancing on the volcano” but pointed out, “I am not thinking of the Icelandic volcano here, but the potential volcano represented by pressure on the euro and threats to a genuinely European vision”. Speaking on behalf of the Greens/EFA group, Bart Staes pointed out that 80% of general budget spending took place in member states and that it was therefore normal that they made a declaration on the situation regarding this spending.
Richard Ashworth explained that British Conservatives would once again refused to grant a discharge on the execution of the general budget because, in his opinion, there were still too many irregularities, even though he recognised that progress had been made with regard to spending on agriculture, research, energy, transport and education.
Søren Søndergaard spoke on behalf of the GUE/NGL group and recognised that progress had been made in 2008 compared to 2007 but the overall judgement of the Danish MEP was negative: structural modifications are necessary and Commission and member states had to put a stop to their mutual accusations regarding waste and irregularities. With regard to parliament's discharge, he regretted the “mutilation” of Mr Staes' report. Marta Andreasen, (EFD, United Kingdom) denounced (as she usually does) management of the institutions: no management committee would allow such a situation, although the discharge has been agreed for the last 15 years. She also fiercely criticised the idea of an “acceptable level of error” for an institution, which she said, was the size of an average bank. Martin Ehrenhauser (Non-Attached, Martin List) made at least 11 proposals to improve how the agencies worked. With regard to the question of the agencies, Jutta Haug (S&D, Germany) sharply criticised the current situation at the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC, based in Stockholm): Sweden wanted this agency but has not been able to work correctly for a whole range of practical reasons (no rental contract, problems with gas and electricity providers etc).
Speaking on behalf the Council, the Spanish Secretary of State for the EU, Au Diego López Garrido, disputed the claimed lack of transparency in budget management: the Council published information about management on its web page last year and distributed a preliminary report on the 2009 accounts for the public at large. With regard to the “gentleman's agreement” (according to which the EP and Council refrained from poking their noses into the other's respective budgets) Mr Lopez Garrido explained that if Parliament wanted a new agreement, the Council was totally prepared to discuss the matter with it.
Jean-Pierre Audy (EPP, France) would like to have an inter-institutional conference bringing together the Commission, Council, Parliaments, national parliaments and control institutions to, “help develop discharge procedures”. Mr Audy explained that with regard to the Council budget, “I do not think that the discharge should be subject to referral”.
German liberal, Jorgo Chatzimarkakis, referred to another “gentleman's agreement” and appealed for an end to certain irregularities. He mentioned: cohesion policy (11% of irregularities is too many) and the NGOs: between 2008 and 2009, the Union paid the latter around €300 million, including those that did not even share the same ideas as it or even acted against it. According to the Greek MEP, a register is necessary. Olle Schmidt (ALDE, Denmark) insisted that EDF aid should not be used to, “ encourage corrupt regimes”. He cited the case of Eritrea, where one was in danger of being sent to prison if one criticised the government. He insisted that the aid should be subject to human rights conditions.
Monika Hohlmeier (EPP, Germany) believed that pre-accession aid to Turkey was causing problems. She explained that she had the impression that if another country was subject is so much criticism, it would have at least had its aid suspended, while examining how the funding was being used. With regard to this question, Markus Pieper (EPP, Germany) was even more explicit and said that the institutions should not, “close their eyes simply because Turkey is involved”. He added that this should not be interpreted as constituting any hostility at all to Turkey but simply an explanation that aid for encouraging closer ties should be used flexibly and by taking into account alternative solutions to accession. Mr Pieper claimed that if no correction was forthcoming, “and things took a turn to the worse, then a bad investment would have been made”. On this point, rapporteur Jens Geier was keen to point out that the criticism made was not just addressed to Turkey but to the Commission as well, which had to ensure respect for pre-accession aid criteria. (L.G.)