Brussels, 04/04/2014 (Agence Europe) - As part of the so-called clearance of accounts procedure, the European Commission decided on Friday 4 April to claim a total of €318 million back from the member states, corresponding to irregular expenditure made under EU agricultural policy.
As some of this money has already been recovered from the member states, the financial impact of the decision will be in the order of €315 million. France is the country most affected by the decision.
The recovered money will be paid back into the EU budget on the grounds of non-compliance with EU rules or inadequate control procedures on agricultural expenditure. Although the member states are responsible for paying out and checking expenditure under the common agriculture policy (CAP), it is the Commission which is required to ensure that the member states have made correct use of the funds available to them.
Under this latest decision, funds will be recovered from 11 member states: Denmark, Germany, Greece, Spain, France, Italy, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Finland and the United Kingdom. The most significant individual corrections are as follows: - €238.90 million (financial impact: €237.83 million) to be paid back by France for weaknesses related to the allocation of entitlements (area-related aid); - €12.94 million (financial impact: €12.04 million) to be reimbursed by Portugal for weaknesses related to cross-compliance; - €10.03 million charged to France for deficiencies in the young farmer measure and in the control of the subsidised loans.
Following the ruling of the Court of Justice of the European Union (T-267/07) against a previous Commission decision, Italy will be reimbursed €2.11 million. (LC)