By Nicola Smith - 18th November 2003
European Commission chief Romano Prodi has announced a radical a shake-up of the EU’s anti-fraud strategy in a bid to avoid another Eurostat scandal.
The affair at the commission’s statistical arm Eurostat, where millions of euro were siphoned into secret bank accounts had “obliged us to think deeply,” said Prodi.
The president defended the commission’s role in the Eurostat affair, blaming its slow reaction on a serious breakdown in communication, particularly between the EU’s anti-fraud body OLAF, EU Commissioners and senior officials.
Turning the spotlight on OLAF, he said if the fraud body had informed the commission sooner “we could have taken action more quickly.”
“The problem is the way the information reached us and the point in time that it linked events together,” he told MEPs. “We acted decisively as soon as we got the information and kept the European Parliament informed at every stage.”
As part of a sweeping review of the commission’s anti-fraud strategy, Prodi said he would revisit the code of conduct between commissioners and their services, to “stress their responsibility.”
“We need to reinforce the information to and from commissioners to help them exercise control of their services,” he said.
Along with Reform and Budget Commissioners, Neil Kinnock and Michaele Schreyer, Prodi said he would take personal responsibility for centralising sensitive information on suspected fraud.
This, he said, would prevent future scenarios like Eurostat where at various stages certain signals emerged but were never brought together.
The events at Eurostat have also prompted the commission to push for major changes in OLAF rules and procedures.
While expressing his continued confidence in the body’s director, Franz Herman Bruenner, Prodi described the current situation as “unsatisfactory.”
Prodi called for increased autonomy for the anti-fraud office. “OLAF must be able to determine its own priorities,” he said, asking for an increase in resources.
However, the commission chief still has an uphill task to win over sceptical MEPs. For many, the commission has done too little, too late.
“I get the impression from your speech that the only people responsible for what went wrong are OLAF,” said Dutch Liberal MEP, Jan Mulder.
“What about the individual responsibility of commissioners?”
Bart Staes, a Belgian Green, was equally unconvinced by the commission’s efforts, also claiming that the commission had not lived up to its responsibilities. “It is only thanks to the European Parliament that the whole puzzle has been put together,” he said.
“Prodi’s so-called action plan is a clear case of shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted,” quipped UK Conservative Chris Heaton-Harris.
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