Angelilli (UEN). – (IT) Mr President, on behalf of my group, I would like once again to express our sympathy for the victims of the massacres of Nasiriya, for their families and for all the European armed forces engaged throughout the world in peace missions combating terrorism

I will now focus my speech on the Eurostat case. There are too many unresolved questions in this affair and the measures that have been taken to remedy matters are few and, I would venture to say, belated and, therefore, probably ineffective. My opinion was confirmed after President Prodi’s hearing before the Committee on Budgetary Control this morning, in which he was, quite frankly, too general and, if I may say so, a little reticent.

As regards the way the affair has been handled, given that we have a President who has made transparency one of his principal objectives, we do not understand why we have witnessed all kinds of endeavours to keep the documentation under wraps and avoid public debate in the Eurostat case, as if we were dealing with a state secret. There are too many questions, as I said. Has this drain on the EU’s funds come to an end? If it has come to an end, when, exactly, did that happen? Just this morning, the fact that the most serious incidents took place before 1999 was stressed once again. What about the less serious incidents? When did they occur? Are they still going on? Most importantly, what is the criterion for assessing the seriousness of an incident? The size of the sum taken, maybe? I would respectfully point out that fraud is serious by its very nature, and it is much more serious and unacceptable when public officials are involved.

Moreover, how is it possible for a fraudulent organisation to have succeeded in operating without hindrance for years in the Commission? Are we really to believe that nobody noticed anything, despite the fact that rumours, faxes and emails on unlawful gains and fake contracts were flying around the Commission departments? What is more, we fail to understand how the Commission’s watchdog system works, for many other outrageous incidents have been discovered in addition to the Eurostat affair, such as the case of cereal prices. In this connection, the most ridiculous thing – it would be laughable if the matter were not so serious – is that the document presented this morning states – and I would draw your attention to this – that we need gradually to lay the foundations for a new culture of responsibility and transparency. What are we to infer from this? That, hitherto, irresponsibility and lack of transparency have been the norm in the Commission?

There is something else that needs to be said on the subject of Eurostat and the serious nature of the scandal surrounding the organisation. This is not just another department, one of the many centres of European bureaucracy: it is an institution which, in carrying out its recording and statistical work, is, in actual fact, the guarantor of the Stability Pact, verifying the implementation of the Maastricht criteria. It therefore plays a part in defining Member States’ economic and financial policies and, in practice, in forcing the States to adopt stringent policies which often involve budgetary or welfare cuts. It is therefore an institution which has a watchdog role and which cannot afford to be associated with even the remotest doubt or suspicion regarding its impartiality or authority of the kind currently surrounding it.

We realise that the affair is embarrassing because public funds have been used for unlawful purposes; we also understand the problem caused by the fact that the affair has exploded at a sensitive time, on the eve of the European elections, of enlargement and of the Constitution; we understand the problem but we cannot compromise on the matter. We can neither condone nor, as some would have us do, underestimate the severity of the incidents of corruption, fraud and malpractice. It is the citizens who demand that we stand firm, the same citizens of whom we ask sacrifices in the name of the Stability Pact. What is more, instead of pointing the finger and making a scapegoat out of some civil servant and bringing the affair to a hasty conclusion in this way, we would have greatly appreciated it if the Commission had fully shouldered its responsibilities, as Mr Santer did over much less.

We cannot let all this pass without speaking out, especially at a time when the President of the Commission is disseminating a political manifesto – or maybe we should call it an electoral manifesto – describing the Europe of his dreams while neglecting the Europe that exists here and now. As if things were not bad enough already! President Prodi is entitled to put himself forward as a candidate for the next European elections, but, if this is his intention, we expect him to do things properly and resign. On the other hand, the damage this would cause at institutional level would be severe and, quite frankly, unacceptable.

(Applause)