Activities of Dennis de JONG related to 2018/2210(DEC)
Shadow reports (1)
REPORT on discharge in respect of the implementation of the budget of the European Union agencies for the financial year 2017: performance, financial management and control PDF (203 KB) DOC (75 KB)
Amendments (11)
Amendment 1 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1
Paragraph 1
1. Emphasises that the Agencies are highly visible in the Member States and have significant influence on policy, decision making and programme implementation in areas of vital importance to European citizens, such as security, safety, health, research, economic affairs, freedom and justice; reiterates the importance of the tasks performed by the agencies and their direct impact on the daily lives of Union citizens; reiterates also the importance of the autonomy of the agencies, in particular of the regulatory agencies and those with the function of independent collection of information; recalls that the main reasons for establishing the agencies were for the purpose of operating Union systems, facilitating the implementation of the European Single Market and making independent technical or scientific assessments; welcomes in this regard the effective overall performance of the agencies, and the progress made in enhancing their visibility to European citizenwhilst recognising that stakeholders have found their way to the agencies, is concerned that in general the visibility of agencies for European citizens is still limited, precisely because of their decentralised nature, whereas for their democratic accountability a high level of visibility is required; reiterates its call for more visibility in Member States by developing a comprehensive plan to reach out to more Union citizens; calls upon the Commission to take more seriously its mandate, confirmed by the IIWG, to look into the possibility of colocation and mergers of agencies with similar or parallel activities and responsibilities;
Amendment 4 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 16 a (new)
Paragraph 16 a (new)
16 a. Emphasizes to take into account the efficiency when (re)locating agencies in Member States; emphasizes that there are two locations for the Railways Agency, four agencies on social policies and nine agencies on Justice and Home Affairs issues; expresses its disappointment with the outcome in this respect of the IIWG on decentralised agencies, as no specific proposals were developed to merge or co-locate agencies concentrating on related policy fields; urges the Commission to submit without delay an evaluation of agencies with multiple locations, as recommended by the IIWG, as well as proposals for possible mergers, closures and/or transfers of tasks to the Commission, on the basis of a careful in-depth analysis and using clear and transparent criteria, as was envisaged in the IIWG’s terms of reference but which was never properly examined owing to a lack of proposals to that effect from the Commission;
Amendment 7 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 21
Paragraph 21
21. Observes that the decentralised agencies increased the use of contract staff to implement new tasks to partially compensate for the 5 % staff cut and for the levy for the creation of the redeployment pool; calls on the Network to develop a general policy to not replace permanent staff by more expensive external consultants;
Amendment 11 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 24 a (new)
Paragraph 24 a (new)
24 a. Encourages the Union agencies to consider adopting a fundamental rights strategy, including a reference to fundamental rights in a code of conduct that could define the duties of their staff and training for staff; setting up mechanisms ensuring that any violation of fundamental rights be detected and reported, and that risks of such violations be swiftly brought to the attention of the main bodies of the agency; establishing, whenever relevant, the position of a fundamental rights officer, reporting directly to the management board to ensure a certain degree of independence vis-a-vis other staff, in order to ensure that threats to fundamental rights are immediately addressed, and that a constant upgrading of the fundamental rights policy within the organization takes place; developing a regular dialogue with civil society organisations and relevant international organizations on fundamental rights issues; making compliance with fundamental rights a central component of the terms of reference of the collaboration of the agency concerned with external actors, including in particular members of national administrations with whom they interact at operational level;
Amendment 14 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 28
Paragraph 28
28. Notes that 77 % of agencies had already set up and implemented internal rules or guidelines on whistleblowing and the other 23 % are in the process of adopting them; urges the remaining agencies to set up and implement internal rules on whistleblowing without further delay; calls on the Network to report to the discharge authority on the adoption and implementation of these measures;
Amendment 15 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 28 a (new)
Paragraph 28 a (new)
28 a. Welcomes the fact that 29 agencies (94%) have guidelines in place for granting public access to documents; calls on the remaining agencies who do not have such guidelines to adopt them without further delay; approves the development of internal systems in place to handle the requests, including specially trained access-to-document teams, dedicated to handling the incoming requests in agencies facing a higher frequency and complexity of requests; calls on the Network to develop common guidelines for applying public access to documents to be implemented by the agencies;
Amendment 16 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 29
Paragraph 29
29. Notes that Declarations of Interest (DoI) of the management board members and senior management are in place in almost all agencies and that these are published by most of the agencies on their website , along with relevant CVs; calls on the Network to continue reporting to the discharge authority on this issue; stresses that management board members and senior management should submit declarations of interest instead of declarations of the absence of conflict of interests; reiterates that it is not for the members or management to declare themselves out of conflict of interest; recalls that a neutral body should assess the existence of conflict of interest; notes with appreciation that some Union agencies, such as EFSA, succeeded in implementing a reliable policy on conflict of interest; notes with regret that since 2012 the European Court of Auditors failed to publish any special report on the management of conflict on interest in selected Union agencies, namely EASA, ECHA, EFSA, EMA; notes that for agencies working with industries a risk of conflict of interest is higher than in other Union agencies;
Amendment 17 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 29 a (new)
Paragraph 29 a (new)
29 a. Recalls that a number of agencies, in particular those issuing authorisations to third parties for bringing products on the market, are vulnerable if they do not have and implement clear and effective rules to prevent conflicts of interest; calls on all agencies to participate in the inter- institutional agreement on the transparency register that is currently subject of negotiations between the Commission, the Council and the Parliament;
Amendment 18 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 29 b (new)
Paragraph 29 b (new)
29 b. Calls on the Agencies to implement a comprehensive and horizontal policy concerning the avoidance of conflicts of interest; and, to use the European Chemicals' Agency's (ECHA) Independence Policy as a best practice and an exemplary system of monitoring and preventing any conflicts of interest; recalls that in accordance with this Independence Policy annual declarations of interests of all staff and experts concerned are compulsory and should be updated if the situation changes, and anyone with a declared interest in an issue is excluded from the decision or opinion making on that matter; encourages, furthermore, the agencies to set up a Conflicts of Interest Advisory Committee;
Amendment 19 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 29 c (new)
Paragraph 29 c (new)
29 c. Emphasizes that the IIWG2 also examined the European Aviation Safety Agency's (EASA) pilot case for fee- financed agencies; states that even if agencies are fully fee-funded, they are still fully accountable to the discharge authority considering the reputational risks involved; expresses, moreover, its concerns with the quality indicators used in the EASA pilot, as these are heavily focusing on customer satisfaction and lesson air safety; expresses concern at the potential conflict of interest that can arise if agencies have to rely on membership fees as their main source of income; emphasizes the need for a steady and predictable flow of income from the Union budget, which is crucial also to planning, rather than having to rely on fees, which are unpredictable and vary from year to year; urges the Commission to submit a proposal for the fees to be paid directly to the Commission and for the agencies to be provided with a regular subsidy from the Union budget in return;
Amendment 23 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 34
Paragraph 34
34. Regrets that the new Financial Regulation9 does not foresee a reduction of the administrative burden that continues to be borne by the decentralised agencies; notes that the audit of the decentralised agencies "remain under the full responsibility of the Court, which manages all administrative and procurement procedures required"; reiterates that the new audit approach involving private sector auditors has resulted in a significant increase in the administrative burden on the agencies, and that the time spent on procurement and administration of audit contracts has resulted in additional expenditure thus straining further the limited resources of the agencies; emphasises that it is necessary to resolve this issue; calls on the parties involved to provide solutions on the issue so as to significantly reduce the administrative burden; calls on the Court to take action by doing random checks; _________________ 9 Regulation (EU, Euratom) 2018/1046 of the European Parliament and the Council of 18 July 2018 on the financial rules applicable to the general budget of the Union