Budgetary control MEPs reject Council accounts for 2013
Parliament should not endorse spending by the European Council and the Council of the EU for 2013 because they have failed to provide the information and documents requested, the budgetary control committee said on Tuesday. Parliament has refused toclear the Council´s accounts every year since 2009.
However, the committee agrees that the European Institute of Technology (EIT) and the joint undertakings ENIAC and Artemis (now merged as Electronic Components and Systems for European Leadership – ECSEL) have implemented many of the recommendations made by Parliament last April, and that heir accounts should therefore be cleared. The committee underlines that it has not received any explanation from the Council for its increasing level of underspending and carryovers of commitments in the 2013 budget. It also notes that it has not received the progress reports it has requested on building projects or information about the impact on the Council´s budget of the administrative modernisation underway. The committee points in particular to the purchase of the Residence Palace building. It wants to know the total amount of appropriations used, the budget item from which those appropriations were drawn, the instalments already paid and those still to be paid. EIT: improved auditing and revised public procurement procedures The committee is more satisfied with the EIT´s reaction to Parliament´s first discharge report and acknowledges that it has addressed the shortcomings detected in the quality of audit certificates and has improved its procurement procedures. The Budapest-based institue has made changes to the planning and monitoring procedures related to budget implementation and has taken action to reduce the high staff turnover. ENIAC and ARTEMIS: new audit arrangements to verify transfers from member states ENIAC and ARTEMIS, which merged in June 2014 to create the Electronic Components and Systems for European Leadership (ECSEL) joint technology initiative, have also taken measures to show that EU funds are spent in a correct and transparent manner. According to the committee´s report, new ex post audit mechanisms have been introduced in order to verify the agreements with the national funding authorities, one of the main issues raised by the European Court of Auditors. Background Parliament is responsible for granting discharge to individual EU institutions, which means approving their spending under the general budget of the European Union. It works on the basis of the European Court of Auditors' reports and non-binding recommendations by the Council and it may grant, postpone or refuse discharge. Discharge is needed for the formal closure of the annual accounts. |
Next steps Parliament as a whole will vote in October on the reports tabled by the Committee on Budgetary Control. |