Activities of Bart STAES related to 2010/2142(DEC)
Shadow reports (1)
REPORT on discharge in respect of the implementation of the general budget of the European Union for the financial year 2009, Section III – Commission and executive agencies PDF (638 KB) DOC (458 KB)
Amendments (13)
Amendment 50 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3
Paragraph 3
3. Notes that in the present understanding of ‘shared management’ most of the management functions are carried out by national bodies not directly accountable at Union level and over which the Commission has no authoritylimited powers of enforcement;
Amendment 56 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 4
Paragraph 4
4. Recalls that the Member States have primary responsibility for day-to-day management and control of Union expenditure under shared management and that national bodies initiate and process files for Union financial support and validate the reimbursement claims presented to the Commission;
Amendment 59 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6
Paragraph 6
6. Notes that the most likely error rate in payments estimated by the Court of Auditors for the policy groups ‘'Agriculture and natural resources’' (EUR 56 318 000 000million), ‘'Research, energy and transport’' (EUR 7 966 000 000million), ‘'External Aid, development and enlargement’' (EUR 6 596 000 000million) and ‘'Education and Citizenship’' (EUR 2 153 000 000million) is between 2 % and 5 %;
Amendment 61 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 7
Paragraph 7
7. Notes that the most likely error rate in payments estimated by the Court of Auditors for the policy group ‘'Cohesion’' (EUR 23 081 000 000million reimbursed certified expenditure) is above 5 %;
Amendment 72 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 10
Paragraph 10
10. Recalls its repeated invitations to the Commission to present a proposal for the introduction of mandatory national management declarations (NMDs) issued and signed at ministerial level and duly audited by an independent auditor so as far as such declarations are a necessary and indispensable first step to improve the efficiency of national systems and to enhance national accountability for the use of Union money, insists that the Commission will present such a proposal by September 2011 irrespective of the fact that some Member States might not yet agree with such an initiative;
Amendment 79 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 11
Paragraph 11
11. Regrets that the Commission uses secondary legislation as an instrument to reduce its responsibility and underlines that ‘shared management’ is not the same as ‘shared responsibilities’; but also points out that for the shared management programmes, Member States do not yet acknowledge fully their enhanced responsibility which is enshrined in Article 317 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union
Amendment 82 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 15
Paragraph 15
15. Further notes the important difference between 'recovery' (sums incorrectly received are repaid by the recipient) and 'financial correction' (addressing weaknesses in the system the financial consequences of which are borne by the national taxpayer); recalls its request that all data concerning recoveries should be an integral part of, and included in, the database of final beneficiaries;
Amendment 90 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 19
Paragraph 19
19. Believes that unspent Union funds should not be returned to the Member States if a Member State has not paid back to the Union amounts incorrectly received and invites the Commission to take into account any financial correction not yet paid by the Member States before returning unspent annual budget appropriations to the Member States; asks that the rules applicable to the Union budget and programmes should be changed accordingly without delay;
Amendment 99 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 21
Paragraph 21
21. Accordingly, does not fully agree with the Commission's statement that financial corrections represent ‘a strong incentive for Member States to improve their management and control systems and thus to prevent or detect and recover irregular payments to final beneficiaries’ (Annual Accounts of the European Union, financial Year 2009, Note 6, page 100);
Amendment 112 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 27
Paragraph 27
27. Believes that a ‘scoreboard’ on the quality of controls per Member State and policy area as requested would be an important element in such an analysis and invites the Commission to follow-up on this request without delay and in time for the 2010 discharge procedure;
Amendment 118 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 31
Paragraph 31
31. Requests, accordingly, the Commission make the Member States' annual summaries publicly available as part of next year's discharge procedure and upgrade the information provided in these summaries to present a meaningful picture of the Member States' financial management performance; underlines that making the Member States' annual summaries publicly available should be considered as a step towards NMDs and not as a goal in itself:
Amendment 131 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 36
Paragraph 36
36. Regrets that the Commission uses the notion ‘tolerable risk of error’ exclusively as a basis to decide what level of irregular use of funds should be considered as acceptable ex-post; takinvites, the view that a forward-looking approach to a possible introduction of a ‘tolerable risk of error’ would includerefore, the Commission to change its approach by transforming the notion 'tolerable risk of error' into a management concept to be translated in the Financial Regulation ainto a new requirement for the Commission's authorising officer by delegation to match spending proposals with an assessment of the irregularity risks and to report in their annual activity reports on the effectiveness of the control measures;
Amendment 152 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 45
Paragraph 45
45. Notes the Court of Justice's decision in the combined cases of Volker and Markus Schecke (C93 and 93/09); stresses the validity of the principle of transparency under Article 30(3) of the Financial Regulation and calls on the Commission to swiftly propose substitutes to the provisions which were held invalid by the Court of Justice either in the Financial Regulation, sectoral legislation or any other act; invites the Commission to monitor the Member States' obligation to publish the data correctly and in a timely manner; insists that the Commission will collect all this data in a single database which is easily accessible to the public;