Activities of Lara WOLTERS related to 2021/2107(DEC)
Plenary speeches (1)
Discharge 2020 (debate)
Shadow reports (1)
REPORT on discharge in respect of the implementation of the general budget of the European Union for the financial year 2020, Section I – European Parliament
Amendments (23)
Amendment 24 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 26
Paragraph 26
26. Welcomes the fact that Strasbourg part-sessions were suspended for the most part in the year 2020 and that digitalised processes included the organisation of remote meetings and remote voting systems in plenary and parliamentary committees; calls on the President of the Parliament to allow for a remote participation of Members until the COVID-19 pandemic is brought to safe levels; notes that the suspension of Strasbourg part-sessions contributed to total savings of EUR 26 260 608 according to Parliament’s Secretariat, while also significantly reducing Parliament’s carbon footprint; highlights that the Court estimates that “the end of moving from Strasbourg to Brussels could generate annual savings of EUR 114 million plus a one-off saving of EUR 616 million if the Strasbourg buildings are successfully divested, or a one-off cost of EUR 40 million if they are not"1a; considers that given the current climate crisis, retaining the Strasbourg seat is irresponsible, calls on the Council to take Parliament’s position into account and act on it as a matter of urgency; _________________ 1a https://www.eca.europa.eu/Lists/ECADoc uments/PL1407_LETTER/PL1407_LETT ER_EN.pdf
Amendment 33 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 30
Paragraph 30
30. Deplores the fact that there is no system in place to ensure that Members who are temporarily absent for a justified reason, such as maternity leave, parental leave, long-term sick leave or career’s leave, can continue to carry out their core duties, first and foremost to speak in debates and to vote; deems this problematic as it can negatively impact citizens’ representation in Parliament; underlines that younger, particularly female, Members and their voters are disproportionately affected when no such arrangements are provided for; emphasizes that a vote for a female member of Parliament should not lead to a lack of representation; calls on the Committee on Constitutional Affairs to provide for the continuation of remote participation and for providing for the substitution of a Member - whether female or male - while on parental leave and in the above mentioned cases; by revising Parliament’s Rules of Procedure and the European Electoral Law; also calls for maintaining the option of remote participation for Members, particularly for Members in the aforementioned situations;
Amendment 73 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 52
Paragraph 52
52. Calls on Parliament to publish a list of all friendship groups in Parliament on its website; Is concerned with the legitimacy that some parliamentary friendship groups may provide to regimes with dubious records regarding human rights and democracy where such groups do not make sufficiently clear that they do not represent Parliament’s official position; considers full transparency and more oversight of these groups essential to prevent reputational damage and conflicts of interest; calls therefore on Parliament to publish a list of all friendship groups in Parliament on its website, including its participants; also calls on the Quaestors to proactively request annual declarations outlining the support and funding received which the participating members have not declared individually already and create an accessible and up-to-date register of these declarations; calls on the Quaestors to develop the rules on such support further;
Amendment 74 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 52 a (new)
Paragraph 52 a (new)
52 a. Deplores the fact that Members are participating in unofficial election observation missions, as well as the expenditure incurred on these missions, believes such missions jeopardise Parliament's reputation; notes eight such instances in 2020 linked to Crimea and Venezuela; calls on the Bureau and democracy support and election coordination group to extend the duration of barring the members concerned from undertaking official election observation missions from one year to the entire mandate, where this is not already the case;
Amendment 77 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 53 a (new)
Paragraph 53 a (new)
53 a. Calls on the Bureau to revise the Code of Conduct by including a prohibition for Members to hire not only direct, but also indirect family members; is surprised that hiring indirect family members is not currently in breach of Parliament’s integrity rules; also calls on the services to amend Article 43 of the Implementing Measures for the Statute for Members accordingly;
Amendment 78 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 54 a (new)
Paragraph 54 a (new)
54 a. Is concerned that out of the 459 Members of the 8th Parliamentary term that were not re-elected in 2019, Parliament received only one notification on post-mandate employment pursuant to Article 6 of the Code of Conduct; points out that notifications could help to prevent conflicts of interest, while also preventing former Members who engage in professional lobbying or representational activities directly linked to the Union’s decision-making process from benefiting from facilities granted to former Members; calls therefore on Parliament to improve the implementation of the Code of Conduct, in this regard also draws attention to the resolution to the 2019 European Parliament discharge, in which Parliament calls for an independent assessment on whether post- mandate activities of Members create conflicts of interests; calls on Parliament’s services again to conduct such an assessment;
Amendment 82 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 55
Paragraph 55
55. Calls on the Advisory Committee on the Conduct of Members to regularly publish on Parliament’s website any investigations, decisions and sanctions related to potential or real breaches of the Code of Conduct, rather than doing so in the annual report; further calls on Parliament to publish decisions and sanctions imposed by the Advisory Committee against Members on the respective Member’s page on Parliament’s website; notes with interest that according to a study by Transparency International1a, the Advisory Committee could be strengthened further with independent experts on ethics and integrity or with an external Committee consisting of independent experts only as well as by strengthening the Committee’s competences; _________________ 1ahttps://transparency.eu/wp- content/uploads/2021/02/EUIS2_EP.pdf
Amendment 83 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 56
Paragraph 56
56. Strongly supports Parliament’s services’ ongoing project to make plenary voting records available on a dedicated space where users will have access to clear and reader-friendly documents, and welcomes the new layout for the roll-call votes in which the individual voting record of each Member will be published, giving the option to visualise the distribution of votes according to inter alia political group affiliation and/or nationality; regrets that it is not yet technically possible for Parliament’s services to allow for the display of the text of each amendment along with the voting record as it is offered by several private providers; calls on Parliamentary services to make available all amendments and roll-call voting records at committee level and to include them in the new layout; also calls on the services to extend the information available to include up-to-date timetables and voting lists, including the final compromise(s) agreed on by the rapporteur and shadows, as per the recommendations from the focus group on strengthening parliamentary prerogatives; further asks Parliament’s services to provide the possibility to Members to test a beta version of the new tool and provide feedback to be taken into account during the development of the tool;
Amendment 86 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 56 a (new)
Paragraph 56 a (new)
56 a. Questions the decision by the Parliament’s Secretariat not to cooperate in an institution-wide study on integrity and ethics undertaken by Transparency International, a leading NGO on transparency and anti-corruption, and refusing to take part in staff interviews, or providing information to the organization in light of transparency being one of the leading principles of Parliament’s work;
Amendment 87 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 56 b (new)
Paragraph 56 b (new)
56 b. Takes note of 18 investigations carried out by Parliament's services in 2020 into the misuse of allowances in which the offices of 12 Members were involved (compared to 6 Members previously), with them total amounts at risk being EUR 1 318 000 (compared to EUR 560 000 in 2019); commends Parliament’s services for their investigations in this regard, while also pointing to the need to continue monitoring the development of the number and types of cases involved;
Amendment 95 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 59
Paragraph 59
59. Recalls that pursuant to Rule 11(4) of Parliament’s Rules of Procedure, Parliament provides Members already with the possibility of publishing a voluntary audit or confirmation of their GEAgeneral expenditure allowance expenses; regrets that only five voluntary declarations on the use of the GEAgeneral expenditure allowance were submitted during the calendar year 2020; calls on Parliament’s services to send an annual reminder to Members in relation to this possibility; calls on the Bureau to periodically inform the discharge authority of the number of Members who have followed these recommendations;
Amendment 100 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 60 a (new)
Paragraph 60 a (new)
60 a. Is concerned that out of the 83 Members whose mandate ended in 2020, 72 of whom left due to the withdrawal of the United Kingdom from the European Union, only two returned unused general expenditure allowance funds by the end of that year; calls on Parliament’s administration and Quaestors to assess this figure and consider further measures to improve the general expenditure allowance return rate among Members who leave Parliament;
Amendment 107 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 62 a (new)
Paragraph 62 a (new)
62 a. Takes note of the efforts of both Parliament and the Commission to ensure former APAs from the British delegations can transfer acquired pension rights to pension funds in the United Kingdom; calls on Parliament to ensure a solution is found;
Amendment 123 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 71
Paragraph 71
71. Notes with serious concern that 17 new harassment cases were opened in 2020; stresses that efforts still need to be made to ensure that the two advisory committees dealing with harassment complaints concerning Members and all members of staff gain more trust from victims of harassment, who may fear that their career or position in Parliament would be at stake if they go through the whole harassment procedure, gather evidence and build their case; urges the Bureau and Secretariat to implement the actions as repeatedly called for in the resolutions on harassment of 26 October 2017 (217/2897 (RSP))1a, 28 November 2019 (2019/2855 (RSP))1b and 10 December 2021 (2021/2986 (RSP))1c, including, notably, publishing the results of an external audit on the current anti-harassment structure in place and making anti-harassment training mandatory for all Members and staff, including persons in managerial roles in the different directorates-general and political groups; _________________ 1a https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/doc ument/TA-8-2017-0417_EN.html 1b https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/doc ument/TA-9-2019-0080_EN.html 1c https://www.europarl.europa.eu/doceo/doc ument/B-9-2021-0587_EN.html
Amendment 142 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 79 a (new)
Paragraph 79 a (new)
79 a. Commends the Parliament’s services on their decision to continue facilitating hybrid press conferences after the pandemic since this can facilitate the reporting on European affairs for journalists who are not present in Strasbourg or Brussels; recommends that audio-visual and other facilities in Brussels, Strasbourg and the European Parliament liaison offices be developed further, including by increasing VoxBox capacity and modernising the press conference rooms in Strasbourg and Brussels to make them more suitable for hybrid press conferences;
Amendment 145 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 83
Paragraph 83
83. Raises concerns on the clearly overpriced purchase price of the SCHOLLcholl building, particularly in light of the reduced need for additional space following adapted working methods since Covid-19, purchased at EUR 74.,9 million EUR, while the market price of the building was previously estimated to be between EUR 42 and 65 million EUR; ;
Amendment 157 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 85 a (new)
Paragraph 85 a (new)
85 a. Calls on the Bureau to take the new health and safety environment, as well as the increase in remote working, into account as criteria for the selection of proposals of renovation/reconstruction of the Paul-Henri Spaak building, given the changed working practices and potential future decrease in physical presence in Parliament;
Amendment 159 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 86
Paragraph 86
86. Takes note of the decision of the Bureau of 23 October 2019 to approve the creation of an IDEA Lab in 2020 with the aim of testing new, innovative solutions in the context of offices and facility management; notes that the decision of the Bureau was not based on any specific cost estimate; further notes that as part of the IDEA Lab, one Member’s office, at a cost of EUR 486. 012 EUR, and adjacent showroom, at a cost of at least EUR 203. 978 Euro, were built and equipped over the course of 2020; considers prudent and expedient use of budget allocated to pilot projects of this nature to be important; reminds the Bureau that clear budget lines should be set prior to such projects and that expenditure should be accounted for transparently; considers the testing of innovative office and facility management solutions useful in general but strongly rejects that the extensive costs incurred in this case are justifiable to taxpayers; further raises a strong concern about the fact that the renovated office space is now occupied by the Cchair of the Bureau’s Bbuilding Wworking Ggroup responsible for the project; finds it important that pilot projects benefit from the assessment of a range of Members and assistants so as to guarantee the most valid test results;
Amendment 182 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 90
Paragraph 90
90. Recalls that the fund was set up in 1990 to provide Members with an additional pension scheme on a voluntary basis; recalls that before the Members statute was introduced in 2009, Members were already eligible for a pension equivalent to that of their colleagues in the national parliaments, with the exception of Italian, French and Luxembourgish Members, who could therefore contribute to special pension schemes of the European Parliament, which were created in 1981 solely for the needs of the aforementioned three nationalities; recalls therefore that the Voluntary Pension Fund has always constituted a purely supplementary pension; 1a; _________________ 1a https://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/ etudes/STUD/2021/659763/IPOL_STU(20 21)659763_EN.pdf
Amendment 184 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 93
Paragraph 93
93. Observes with concern that the European Court of Justice estimates that the fund will be insolvent by 2024, while the fund’s last payouts are estimated to be made only by 2091; reiterates that the Bureau’s own commitment to guaranteeing the fund does not constitute a legal obligation to guarantee particular levels of payouts of the fund as no contract between the fund and Parliament exists; appeals to the Bureau, the board of directors and the members of the voluntary pension fund to support measures aiming at limiting the deficit of the voluntary pension fund, while considering any further measures in this light;
Amendment 187 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 94
Paragraph 94
94. Notes with interest that, according to Parliament’s Legal Service, it follows from the two judgments that the Court of Justice confirms that acquired rights as such, of Members who have already fulfilled all the necessary conditions for the acquisition of the right to the additional voluntary pension, are fully protected under the general principles of Union law; notes, however, that the judgments also confirm that this does not prevent the Bureau from modifying the conditions as well as modalities of this group of Members on the condition that the principle of proportionality is duly respected, as well as for those Members who have not yet fulfilled all the conditions for the acquisition of pension rights and who therefore only hold future entitlements under the pension scheme, a situation which is further confirmed by the judgement of the Court of Justice of 25 September 2020 in Case C- 223/19:, YS v NK1a; asks the Secretary- General and the Bureau to guarantee that no taxpayer money is used for any future bail-out; considers that a review of the financial model of the fund would not be sufficient to prevent additional taxpayers money from being used for future payments; urges the Secretary-General therefore to also propose measures on adjusting the modalities of the fund, including a further increase of the retirement age and a reduction of pension benefits paid out; _________________ 1aJudgment of the Court of Justice of 24 September 2020,YS v NK,C-223/19, ECLI:EU:C:2020:753.
Amendment 194 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 101 a (new)
Paragraph 101 a (new)
101 a. Welcomes Parliament's intention to introduce sustainability reporting, which will include social aspects of procurement, calls on Parliament to monitor developments in the field of social and sustainable public procurement, such as the OECD work on public procurement and responsible business conduct, as well as the upcoming Union legislation on corporate due diligence; believes that by incorporating responsible business standards in its procurement and purchasing policies, Parliament can lead by example, safeguard public interest and ensure the accountability of public spending; commends the responsible Parliament services for extending Parliament’s environmental management system to cover other sustainability elements, as well as the setting up of a working group on socially responsible public procurement;
Amendment 195 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 101 b (new)
Paragraph 101 b (new)
101 b. Welcomes the complete removal of thermal cameras produced by Hikvision used on Parliament’s premises; calls on Parliament to prevent the purchase and use of products that may have been produced in violation of sustainability standards and human rights in future; is convinced this can be achieved primarily by incorporating human rights and environmental due diligence standards and practices in Parliament’s procurement procedures;