Activities of Bart STAES related to 2012/2167(DEC)
Shadow reports (1)
REPORT on discharge in respect of the implementation of the general budget of the European Union for the financial year 2011, Section III – Commission and executive agencies PDF (698 KB) DOC (568 KB)
Shadow opinions (1)
OPINION on discharge in respect of the implementation of the European Union general budget for the financial year 2011, Section III - Commission
Amendments (38)
Amendment 13 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point a
Paragraph 1 – point a
(a) The Commission should annually adopt a communication to the European Parliament, the Council and the Court of Auditors with a view to making public all the amounts (in nominal terms) recovered per Member-State, International organisation or third country in the course of the preceding year through financial corrections and recoveries for all management modes at the level of the Union and by Member States; the Commission should demonstrate to the greatest possible extent that the financial corrections adequately compensated for errors made, and that they contributed to lasting improvements of the management and control systems;
Amendment 14 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point a a (new)
Paragraph 1 – point a a (new)
(aa) Points out that recoveries should be made for the total amount of the Union' s contribution of a project if due to errors or mismanagement of funds by national or regional authorities the project fails largely to achieve it aims even when a part of the project has been financed and funds have already been dispersed;
Amendment 20 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point c b (new)
Paragraph 1 – point c b (new)
(cb) The Commission shall report how it intends to improve as soon as possible its provision to introduce a pro-active management of potential conflict of interests and 'revolving doors';
Amendment 21 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point c c (new)
Paragraph 1 – point c c (new)
(cc) The Commission shall report how it has implemented Article 5(3) of the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control and how it intends to improve and clarify existing rules;
Amendment 22 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point c d (new)
Paragraph 1 – point c d (new)
(cd) The Commission should provide Parliament as soon as possible with an overview about all (public and non- public) documents and all persons involved in the negotiations of the four cooperation agreements with the tobacco industry;
Amendment 26 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point f
Paragraph 1 – point f
(f) collect information from Member States concerning the degree to which national rules render Union legislation on budget management unnecessarily complicated (‘gold-plating’); recalls that an infringement of those national rules represents an error in budget management terms and that the Commission is ultimately responsible for errors in implementing the Union budget (Article 317 TFEU); requests that this information is sent to the national parliaments once a year and that Parliament's Committee on Budgetary Control is duly informed;
Amendment 28 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point g
Paragraph 1 – point g
(g) support the management and control authorities of the Member States in identifying the systemic sources of errors and give guidance in the form of motivated opinions to those authorities in their simplification efforts; these opinions will be made public;
Amendment 46 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point v
Paragraph 1 – point v
(v) The Commission services should develop a new culture of performance, defining in their management plan a number of targets and indicators meeting the requirements of the Court of Auditors in terms of relevance, comparability and reliability; furthermore performance indicators and targets should be fully integrated in all proposals for new policies and programmes;
Amendment 47 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point v a (new)
Paragraph 1 – point v a (new)
(va) Asks the Commission to take full account on the remarks and requests formulated in the 'Response of the European Court of Auditors to the Commission's second Article 318 evaluation report';
Amendment 49 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point x a (new)
Paragraph 1 – point x a (new)
(xa) Expects that in the framework of a new and enhanced policy on performance, all evaluation reports done or paid for by the Commission will be made public:
Amendment 53 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point z
Paragraph 1 – point z
(z) collect reliable data on the customs and VAT gap in the Member States, and report on a regularsix month basis to Parliament in this regard;
Amendment 54 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point a a
Paragraph 1 – point a a
(aa) identify and implement actions which would increase the effectiveness and efficiency of the collection of customs duties and VAT in the Member States, suggest that in future the percentage of customs duties which the Member States are entitled to keep to cover administrative costs should depend on their effectiveness to collect these duties and not only on the absolute amounts collected;
Amendment 55 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point a b
Paragraph 1 – point a b
(ab) identify the channels and schemes allowing for tax evasion and tax avoidance and promote appropriate countermeasures, in particular by multinationals and through post box companies and promote appropriate countermeasures, and to work closely together with the OECD on this issue in the preparation of its report asked for by the G20;
Amendment 57 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 – point a c
Paragraph 1 – point a c
(ac) raise the Member States' awareness, in the context of the negotiations on the Multiannual Financial Framework, of the uncollected revenue aspects and their impact on the availability of the Union's own resources, the economic situation of the Member States and the internal market and commission a study which would calculate the potential financial benefits for the Member States in tax revenue terms if an equal level playing field against tax evasion and tax avoidance throughout the Union should be created;
Amendment 62 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 11
Paragraph 11
11. Welcomes the fact that the Commission has given Parliament access to the Member States' annual summaries; deplores, however, the fact that only 17 Member States gave the Commission permission to do so; asks the Commission to communicate which steps and measures it will take to see to it that the remaining 10 Member States will also grant their permission;
Amendment 74 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 18
Paragraph 18
18. Notices that there are differences of opinion between the Court of Auditors and the Commission with regard to the way in which errors should be calculated, in particular as to whether pre-financing should be included or excluded, as to the handling of quantifiable and non- quantifiable errors, and as to the way in which recoveries and financial corrections should be considered in the error calculation; is of the opinion that the differences of opinion mirror the different roles respectively played by the institutions, namely the role of auditor on the one hand and manager on the other, requests the Court of Auditors to consider the possibility to separate these contested different categories of error rates in its next annual report and to qualify the recovery and financial corrections policies/results per sector;
Amendment 87 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 30
Paragraph 30
30. RemindsExpects that Member States are fully aware of their obligations, pursuant to Article 4(3) TFEU and pursuant to the principle of sincere cooperation, to assist in an active and effective way the Union in carrying out tasks which flow from the Treaties;
Amendment 90 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 33
Paragraph 33
33. Is convinced that the above mentioned declarations, in combination with a to be introduced self- critical deliberation in the Council and an even-handed, which is lacking until now, and an even-handed and honest and open peer review among Member States, would result in better and more effective budget execution – a result which is preferable to budget cuts; , increase the performance of policies, programmes and projects and which will help to reinforce the solidarity between Member-States and replace mutual distrust, a result which is preferable to budget cuts to the detriment of economic recovery and the trust of the European citizens in a common Europe;
Amendment 91 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 34
Paragraph 34
34. Welcomes the fact that Member States may, at the appropriate level, publish information as referred to in paragraph 32, and – in addition – provide declarations signed at an appropriate level based on that information; calls on the Commission to assist the Member States in providing those voluntary management declarations as referred to in Article 59(5) of the new Financial Regulation (EU, Euratom) No 966/2012 by promoting best practices and rewarding those who follow such practices; insists that Parliament should receive both the management declarations and the voluntary declarations;
Amendment 99 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 37
Paragraph 37
37. Urges all other Member States to follow without delay the example of the 15 Member States that have included an ‘overall level of assurance statement’ in their annual summaries for structural actions in the European Social Fund (ESF) and the ERDF*1 in order for the Committee on Budgetary Control to benefit from this information during the 2012 discharge procedure; expects that those Member- States who will not submit such a statement in time will submit a comprehensive statement explaining the reasons why;
Amendment 113 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 42
Paragraph 42
42. WelcomesTakes note of the guidance given by the Secretary-General of the Commission and the Director-General of DG Budget to the Directors-General and heads of services of the Commission on how to calculate the residual error rate, which led to an improvement in some annual activity reports as pointed out by the Court of Auditors;
Amendment 125 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 59 a (new)
Paragraph 59 a (new)
59a. Calls on the Council and the COREPER to see to it that on a regular basis national controls systems in particular and the co-responsibility of the Member States for better spending in general are put as specific points on the agenda of the competent Council meetings of ministers and discussed in the presence of the Commission;
Amendment 138 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 67
Paragraph 67
67. Welcomes the entry into force of the European Stability Mechanism but reiterates its warning against the setting-up of that Mechanism outside the Union's institutional framework as this precludes any actual democratic and budgetary control by the institutions of the Union, deems it essential that the ESM will be discussed at least once a year in a plenary debate in the presence of the Council and the Commission;
Amendment 145 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 73
Paragraph 73
73. Notes that the Court of Auditors, in its annual report, found that the revenue calculation was free from material error; is concerned however that, as far as traditional own resources (TOR) are concerned, the Court's audit does not cover undeclared imports or those that have escaped customs surveillance, and that the annual report does not therefore provide an estimation of losses to the Union budget in that respect; suggests to the Court of Auditors to issue a special report on undeclared imports based on a survey in at least 10 Member-States and to adjust its working programme for 2013 accordingly;
Amendment 148 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 78
Paragraph 78
78. Underlines that the Court's findings in its Special Report No 13/2011 were corroborated by the conclusions of the fact- finding mission of Parliament's Budgetary Control Committee to the ports of Rotterdam and Antwerp, which took place on 19 and20 September 2012; notes that Rotterdam, the largest European port, attracts a lot of ships thanks to the simplified Dutch data processing systemgranted a high-level of simplified custom procedures to importers compared with other major ports in the Union; stresses that simplification of customs procedures should not lead to less effective control systems in European ports, or lead to distortion of competition and that ‘simplified procedures’ should be effectively controlled by the Member States; notes that reduced controls could translate into major economic advantages for a port, points out, however, that seeking such competitive advantages may seriously harm the financial interests of the Union and its Member States;
Amendment 151 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 79
Paragraph 79
79. WelcomesTakes note of the initiatives taken by the Commission by way of follow-up to the Court of Auditors' Special Report No 13/2011; regrets, however, that, according to the First Eurofisc Activity Report for 2011 issued in May 2012, the main findings and observations of that Special Report are still outstanding; would like to be informed before September 2013 on progress made;
Amendment 152 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 80
Paragraph 80
80. Is seriously concerned, in particular, by the finding of the Working Field 3 that, in most Member States, tax administrations have no direct access to customs data and that automated cross-checking with tax data is therefore not possible;
Amendment 153 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 81
Paragraph 81
81. Regrets that Recommendation No 6 of Special Report No 13/2011, calling for amendment of the VAT Directive in order to identify separately the intra-community supplies following imports under the procedure in question in the trader's VAT recapitulative statement, which would allow an effective reconciliation between the customs and tax data in the Member State of importation, has not been implemented by the Commission, would like to be informed of the reasons why this was not done;
Amendment 258 #
Motion for a resolution
Subheading after paragraph 174 (new)
Subheading after paragraph 174 (new)
OLAF
Amendment 259 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 174 a (new)
Paragraph 174 a (new)
Amendment 260 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 174 b (new)
Paragraph 174 b (new)
174b. Is worried about several cases in 2011 for which the OLAF Director- General has denied the Supervisory Committee sufficient access to case files; emphasizes the importance of full information of the Supervisory Committee, since it endangers the fundamental rights of persons concerned by OLAF investigations and opens the possibility of indemnity claims; urges the Director-General to take the necessary measures to ensure the full and timely information of the Supervisory Committee, so that it can fulfil the role foreseen in the Regulation (EC) No 1073/1999 to its full extent; welcomes the principal idea of a working arrangement between the Director-General and the OLAF Supervisory Committee; invites the Director-General and the supervisory board to explain the details of the working arrangement in a meeting of Parliament's Committee on Budgetary Control;
Amendment 261 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 174 c (new)
Paragraph 174 c (new)
174c. Has noticed the signature of the memorandum of understanding between OLAF and the European Communities Trade Mark Association by the OLAF Director-General; is worried about a possible extension of OLAF's mandate beyond its core competences that might lead to a weakening of OLAF's investigational capacity;
Amendment 262 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 174 d (new)
Paragraph 174 d (new)
174d. Has taken note of several cases where the proper treatment of persons concerned by OLAF in respect to their fundamental rights has been successfully challenged in court; is of the opinion that the supervision of OLAF's investigational activities by the Supervisory Committee needs to be strengthened but a sufficient number staff, to be nominated by them, would be made available; underlines the need of a separate budget line and separate establishment plan;
Amendment 263 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 174 e (new)
Paragraph 174 e (new)
174e. Is worried about the functionality of OLAF's Supervisory Committee, since one of its Members has withdrawn temporarily from her position in the Committee, being subject to investigations in her home country; calls on the Supervisory Committee to remedy the situation, so that the Committee is again fully manned and functional as soon as possible and functional without delay;
Amendment 264 #
Motion for a resolution
Subheading after paragraph 174 f (new)
Subheading after paragraph 174 f (new)
Secretary General
Amendment 265 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 174 g (new)
Paragraph 174 g (new)
174g. Recalls that the Secretary General assured the Budgetary Control Committee in her hearing in January 2013 that her work regarding the drafting of the tobacco directive considered only horizontal issues; takes note of the correspondence of the Secretary General with DG SANCO, which goes well beyond horizontal issues, referring to an agreement between the Secretary General and DG SANCO before inter-service consultation has been launched; calls on the Commission to inform Parliament in detail about the content of the agreement and the reasoning behind the intervention of the Secretary General in that matter;
Amendment 266 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 180 a (new)
Paragraph 180 a (new)
180a. Notes that the Union is a under signatory to the WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC); deems the implementation of Article 5(3) as a legally binding obligation to the Union; calls on the Commission to report on how the provisions of Article 5(3) have been implemented in the Union and its institutions, especially considering the following question: how far does implementation follow guidelines set by the WHO to Article 5(3); questions where and why the Commission has deviated from those guidelines?;
Amendment 276 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 209 a (new)
Paragraph 209 a (new)
209a. Considers that by June 2013, the Council will produce a roadmap on the multiple seats of Parliament, whereby Parliament's Secretary-General and its Bureau will provide Members with up-to- date figures and information on the financial and environmental impact of the multiple seat arrangement; wonders if it is possible that by the above mentioned date, the Commission provides information on the total costs, on an annual basis, of its presence in Strasbourg during session weeks;