BETA

24 Amendments of Ingeborg GRÄSSLE related to 2011/2232(DEC)

Amendment 4 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital B
B. whereas there has been an unprecedented substantial increase in the number of Agencies over the last decade, from 3 in 2000 to 24 in 2010,
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 26 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 4 a (new)
4a. Notes that some Agencies have difficulties in spending their budgets in a timely manner and that funds are committed against projects unrelated to the financial year; is irritated by the fact that significant amounts of budget are allocated in the end of the financial year; considers this as a possible sign that Union funds are, in some cases, used unnecessarily; calls on the Court of Auditors and especially the Agencies themselves to provide additional information and justification in the cases of CEDEFOP, CPVO, EFSA, EMSA, ENISA, ERA, EUROJUST and FRA that have spent more than 25% of their budgets in the final two months of 2010, as well as on the cases of CEPOL, CPVO, FRONTEX and again EMSA that exhibit continuously high percentages of carry- forwards which have to be cancelled;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 27 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 4 b (new)
4b. Is irritated by the fact that in the cases of ECHA, ENISA, ERA, EUROFOUND, FRA, CEPOL, EU-OSHA, EFSA, EUROJUST, ECDC, FRONTEX, OHIM the ratio of accruals versus carry- forwards in 2010 was lower than 50%; calls on additional information and justification of the Agencies mentioned above since this indicates that over half of their carry-forwards is related to activities undertaken in the next year and this would, if unjustified, breach the principle of annuality;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 29 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 5
5. Notes once more a large volume of carryovers and cancellations of operational appropriations by several Agencies in the financial year 2010; regrets that the Court of Auditors failed to report the level of appropriations carried forward and/or cancelled by ECHA, EEA, EMSA and CEPOL in the Court of Auditors’ reports on annual accounts for the financial year 2010;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 39 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9 a (new)
9a. Calls on the Commission and all relevant parties involved in the budgetary procedure to implement as soon as possible the Court of Auditors’ recommendation for a zero-based budgeting approach for Agencies when drawing up Agencies’ budgets, meaning that the budget of each Agency is drawn up without reference to historical amounts and is determined by the stand- alone needs of each Agency;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 40 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 10
10. Recalls that the budget of the Agencies must be balanced; underlines that some Agencies generate profits through their activities, which sometimes lead to a surplus; is of the opinion that, for the Agencies fully financed from the budget of the European Union, the surplus generated in year n should be clearly deducted from the Union subsidy for year n+1;deleted
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 42 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 10 a (new)
10a. Asks the Agencies to examine their internal administrative processes with a view to reducing administrative burden; points in particular to procurement and recruitment processes where there might be scope for a significant shortening;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 43 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 10 b (new)
10b. Presses on Agencies to consider their own administrative costs compared to those of their peers when preparing future resource plans and to have regard to the table of comparative administrative staff gradings when making future appointments to such posts;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 52 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 25
25. Urges in particular that the Agencies take action in order to ensure that their AWP is appropriately complete and contains all the information required (i.e. information on all activities carried out by the Agency and on the resources planned per activities) and additionally include detailed information and estimates for the appropriations carried over to the next year;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 56 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 28
28. Urges the Agencies to standardise the structure of their AARs in accordance with the format used by the Commission’s Directorates-General (DGs) and, accordingly, to provide detailed and complete information on: the implementation of their AWP, budget and staff policy plan, indicators for the budgetary management such as year-end spending (i.e. the budget commitments made by the Agency in the final three months of the year), management and internal control systems, internal/external audit findings, the follow-up to the audit recommendations, the discharge recommendation, and the statement of assurance of the Executive Director; calls also on the Agencies to provide in their AAR information resulting from the Financial Statements and from the report on budgetary and financial management foreseen in the context of the discharge procedure, provided the time constraints of the preparation of the Union annual consolidated accounts are respected;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 85 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 48
48. Repeats its callIs pleased by the intention onf the Court of Auditors to make a comprehensive analysis of the Agencies’ approach and concrete practice for the management of the situations of the conflicts of interest, in order to stop the existing conflicts and prevent future ones;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 98 #
Motion for a resolution
New subheading after paragraph 59
Flexible working hours – leave
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 99 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 59 a (new)
59a. Calls on all agencies to inform the relevant discharge authority of the number of days of leave authorised to each grade under the flexitime and compensatory leave schemes in 2010;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 104 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 64
64. Notes that in reality both the IAS and to a large extent the Court of Auditors act as advisors to the Agencies and provide them with non-public recommendations to address their shortcomings; is seriously concerned that nonegive recommendations to the Agencies to address their shortcomings; welcomes the effort of bothe audit institutions performs a control of the Agencies to be reflected in a public document; wonders if both the IAS and the Court of Auditors internally support the Agencies to address their wrong, who is controlling them through public analyses and reports; callsto supply Agencies with useful advice so that they can correct their shortcomings; reminds the Agencies with emphasis to take the recommendations seriously and undertake the necessary measures to correct their shortcomings; demands the IAS to inform the budgetary authority about shortcomings in the reports compiled by Agencies’ directors corresponding to Article 78(5) of Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 2343/2002 and to openly publish the refore for a clear separation of tasks betwcommendations given to the Agencies in order to guaranteen the IAS and the Court of Auditorpublic character and therewith the effectiveness of their auditing tasks;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 108 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 65
65. UrEncourages the Court of Auditors, therefore, to seriously and impartially exercise its controlling andcontinue its auditing functions on the Agencies in an impartial manner and reflect its findings and recommendations through its public annual or special reports to enable Parliamentthe budgetary authority to fulfil its discharging function fully and for the public to know how the Agencies are managed and which the wrongs were identified;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 110 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 66
66. Urges the Court of Auditors, in addition, during its audit procedures of the Agencies, to make sure that the Agencies’ calls for preparation, publication, evaluation and contract management phases respect in full the principle of maximum and open competition and the principle of value- for-money; urges, in addition, the Court of Auditors to verify the real turnover of the companies contracted by each Agency in order to ensure that the turnover is not related to changes occurring in the contractors’ official name;deleted
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 113 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 66 a (new)
66a. Asks the Court of Auditors, as the relevant data accrue in the process of auditing, to provide a public database including inter alia the following in an easily accessible format (e.g. Excel files and/or CSV files): - budget commitments made in the last three months of the year, - appropriations carried-over in relation to the Agencies’ budget, - discrepancy between the Agencies’ estimated (ex-ante) and actual (ex-post) appropriations carried over, - average cash-holding per month, - cancelled appropriations in relation to average cash holdings over the year, - interest earnings relative to Agencies’ average cash holdings, - average cash holdings in relation to average expenses per day, - unique users on Agencies’ website and publications/press releases made by the Agencies in relation to resources allocated to public relations; Urges, therefore, the Agencies to provide the Court of Auditors timely with the necessary data and estimates;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 114 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 66 b (new)
66b. Asks the Court of Auditors to compose an openly accessible and transparent ranking procedure for agencies by using important indicators in the fields of good financial and budgetary management, low governance costs as well as efficient operational effectiveness and provide the underlying data in an easily accessible format (e.g. Excel-files and/or CSV files);
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 120 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 68
68. Is seriously concerned that despite Parliament’s requests, the Court of Auditors’ reports on the annual accounts for 2010 include only half of the information provided in previous years (in 2010: 38 comments for 24 Agencies, in 2009: 69 comments for 22 Agencies and in 2008: 69 comments for 23 Agencies) and that most of the Court of Auditors’ comments on the 2010’s reports include only general statements and not precise information and findings; is concerned that the Court of Auditors did not act as an independent controlling authority and acted against the interests of the Union and the European citizens’ right to know how their money is spent and how the Agencies are managed; recalls, in this context, that the Agencies serve the public interest and should be accountable to the citizens whose interest claim to serve;deleted
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 124 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 69
69. Recalls moreover that the Court of Auditors failed at reporting the level of appropriations carried over from 2009 to 2010 and those cancelled, for at least ECHA, EEA, EMSA and CEPOL in its reports on the Agencies for the financial year 2010; finds that this failure is unacceptable;deleted
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 125 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 69
69. Recalls moreover that the Court of Auditors failed at reporting the level of appropriations carried over from 2009 to 2010 and those cancelled, for at least ECHA, EEA, EMSA and CEPOL in its reports on the Agencies for the financial year 2010; finds that this failure is unacceptable;deleted
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 129 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 70
70. Is seriously concerned that, despiteWelcomes the Court of Auditors’ inefformationts to provided in its Annual Work Programme and the persistent requests from Parliament, which is, after all, one of the European stakeholders, the two Special Reportsith additional information related to Agencies dealing with: a) cost bench-marking of Union Agencies and b) conflicts of interest with the management at the Agencies, are still not ready or made available; notes that the Special Report on cost benchmarking of the Agencies was initially planned by the Court of Auditors for October 2011 but has still not been issued, and that the Court of Auditors’ representative stated orally in Parliament’s Committee on Budgetary Control that it is still working on the 17th draft, but failed so far to send the final report or a draft to Parliament despite repeated requests; is concerned that in these circumstances the ‘urges the Court of Auditors to enhance its efforts to provide Parliament timely with thorough information regarding conflicts of interest with the management’ report will not be issued on time by the Court of Auditors and/or it will not reflect the real situation at the Agencies and further information on the subject of bench-marking;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 134 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 71
71. Urges the Court of Auditors, once more, to provide the discharge authority with the report on cost benchmarking of Union Agencies in its current state in good time to allow the Parliament to consider it for the 2010 discharge and to issue within the deadline a serious and comprehensive report on the conflicts of interest management in the Union Agencies;deleted
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT
Amendment 152 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 80 a (new)
80a. Calls on the Commission to elaborate options on how professional management for cash held by the Agencies could be organised and implemented;
2012/03/07
Committee: CONT