Human Bio-Science (HBS) — follow-up to Written Question P-004579/2014

13.10.2016

Question for written answer P-007742-16
to the Commission
Rule 130
Ingeborg Gräßle (PPE)

Funding totalling EUR 13.5 million has been approved for a Human Bio-Science (HBS) project, based in Luckenwalde, to build a wound dressing factory, and EUR 6.5 million has already been paid out. The owner of HBS was convicted of tax fraud in 2004.

1. In response to Written Question P-004579/2014, the Commission stated that the project is under shared management. How much EU money has been spent on the project? When was each instalment paid?

2. In its answer to the above question, the Commission also stated the following: ‘The methods of payment through the recipients were able to be verified by original documents’. Legal proceedings before the Higher Administrative Court of Berlin-Brandenburg revealed that no original bank statements had been submitted, but that the Commission had transferred EU funds regardless. What explanation does the Commission have for its assertion that it made payments on the basis of original bank statements, given that the development bank responsible claimed in court not to have had any originals in its possession?

3. What is the Commission going to do about the obviously false statements it made in its answer to the parliamentary question referred to above?