Yellow card for EU accounts

The European Court of Auditors has given a qualified approval to the EU budget for 2004.

Speaking at the European Parliament plenary session in Strasboug, ECA president Hubert Weber said that the court was unable to sign off the EU accounts for the eleventh successive year.

But he added that there had been some improvement in the quality of the accounts compared to the previous year, with the ECA sure of nearly one-third of EU spending, compared to just six per cent in 2003.

Weber said that for a large number of spending areas – notably agricultural spending – the court was not in a position to approve the accounts.

“The supervisory and control systems are not yet implemented and operating effectively and payments are still affected by errors,” he told MEPs.

But he stressed that this did not mean that fraud was rife throughout the EU.

“The court’s opinion on these matters cannot be interpreted as all transactions of the 2004 payment budget being affected by error or as an indication of fraud.”

Agricultural spending was particularly error-strewn, Weber said, although the European Commission and national governments had improved their controls compared to the previous year.

He said that new control measures covering 59 per cent of farm payments had had a positive impact “where properly applied”.

But he added that checks on payments covering 37 per cent of agricultural payments not covered by these new measures “did not provide reasonable assurance that they comply with legislation”.

Weber was particularly critical of the national authorities, who account for 80 per cent of budget payments.

“The improvement in systems and controls at the level of the commission has not been reflected in those within the member states.”

He urged national authorities to work more closely with the commission to work more closely to identify areas for improvement.

He suggested, for example, extending the scope of current checking procedures to include the legality and regularity of expenditure.

Commission recognises room for improvement

Siim Kallas, the commission vice-president who is responsible for relations with the ECA, said that he welcomed the court's assessment.

“The report says the commission is implementing tangible improvements, but of course there are many areas that still need to be improved.”

He stressed that the member states needed to do more.

“The declaration by finance ministers at the ECOFIN meeting last week was not as radical as the commission had hoped,” Kallas said.

The commission had hoped that national governments would take more responsibility for ensuring that EU money was spent correctly but their declaration fell short of that goal.

And MEPs also berated the British EU presidency - representing the member states - for failing to send a representative to hear the auditors' report.

“It is a scandal,” said one member.

 

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