EU ekonomi - Kategoriarkiv

Dear President Schulz,
Dear Colleagues,

In your speech to the European Council of February 7, you presented the idea of holding a secret ballot on the vote of the multiannual financial framework of 2014-2020. I believe this would be a huge mistake.

The idea of Parliament considering a secret ballot has already damaged the reputation of the European Parliament as a democratic institution. Making such a crucial vote secret goes against the spirit of transparency and democracy. And it is pure energy for anti-European forces.

If members cannot be honest with their voters, then what is the point of representing them? Feeling voters’ pressure is not a problem, it is a cornerstone of democracy.

We are not the rulers of the people, they are our rulers.

They have entrusted us with the privilege of serving them. And when they vote in 2014, they will hold us responsible.

The 2014-2020 multiannual financial framework will probably be one of the most important votes. Making it secret is not only un-democratic and un-European – It will mean that the European Parliament denies the citizens their right to execute accountability.

For me personally, taking part in a secret ballot would not feel right. It would be hard for me to, with a clear conscious, contribute to legitimize such an unworthy and non-transparent practice.

The European Parliament must act vigorously to regain the trust of the people. I therefore urge you, Mr President, to reconsider the idea of a secret ballot.

Sincerely,
Christofer Fjellner (EPP-SE)

Citerades i  Svd under mellandagarna angåend EU:s smörhärva. Allvarligt att kommissionen sopar frågan under mattan när revisionsrätten kallar det bedrägeri!

Europas länder måste få bättre budgetdisciplin. Inkomster och utgifter måste gå ihop och enorma statsskulder måste betalas av. Så enkelt är det faktiskt: Man kan inte göra av med pengar man inte har. Detta oavsett hur långa nätter man manglar eller hur avancerade pyramidkonstruktioner man bygger med olika påhittiga räddningspaket.

Idag skriver jag på sidan 4 i Expressen.

FIRST ROUND OF QUESTIONS

“Progress” is a word you often here at this time of the year. I have been Member of Parliament since 2004 and each year at this time you here that the Commission is “making progress” and “on the right track”.

In the same breath, the Commission also ensures that current weaknesses will be remedied in the next period and in the next set of regulations.

At the beginning of my career as Member of this House I found it very assuring.

I was happy to know that the Union’s manager – the Commission which has final responsibility for the implementation of the budget – was confident that things would be better

But then, having heard the same tape for some years, at some point I realised that the Commission’s way of speaking seems open-ended.

The Commission is making fantastic progress every year, but even so: we never get there; we never achieve the objective. What we want is always ahead of us.

Mr. Chairman, this year the Commission believes it is making progress even if – according to the Court – the situation remains stable:

“overall the supervisory and control systems are still only partially effective”
and
“payments underlying the accounts for the year ended 31 December 2010 are still materially affected by error”.

The fact that the Commission is able to turn the Court’s message of a stable situation into something positive by labelling it “progress” sounds a bit too optimistic to me…

In my view stable is no progress and – as I mentioned before – it is not good!

Chairman, I now come to my detailed questions. And at this stage I would like to raise questions of five different topics:

1. Audit and DG REGIO

Commissioner Semeta, you are the Commissioner responsible for “audit”.

Do you consider yourself co-responsible together with Commissioner Hahn for reducing the error rate of 7,7% in Cohesion Policy?

Do you have any influence on DG REGIO’s way of implementing the budget?

Can DG REGIO do whatever they want to or do you – as Commissioner responsible for audit – have a word to say on their instruments?

If you have a word to say: is it BIG enough?

An example:
Let’s say that DG REGIO has invented something which gives Member States a lot of flexibility and DG REGIO good possibilities for disbursing the budget.

On the other hand, you come to the conclusion that from an audit and accountability point of view the thing invented by DG REGIO is a bit risky.

What is your responsibility in such a situation?

What is the responsibility of the Commissioner for DG REGIO?

Is there a common understanding on each one’s area of responsibility?

2. Financial engineering instruments

Financial engineering instruments play a prominent role in the Court’s findings for 2010 and I welcome the Court’s efforts in this area.

In the Commission’s analysis of errors in Cohesion Policy financial engineering instruments are considered “high risk”.

Could you please explain why FEIs are going to be used more frequently in the next Multi-annual financial framework if they are “high risk” instruments?

Furthermore, please tell us which other policy areas are affected by FEIs as mentioned by the Court and to what extent?

3. Reliability of Commission’s management representations

I would like to thank the Court for putting a focus on

• the Annual Activity Reports,
• the Synthesis Report of the Commission and
• now the new Opinion of the Commission’s Internal Auditor.

These are important accountability instruments which need to be closely scrutinised by the Court so that we MEPs can have trust in them.

And it is worrying what I read:

Firstly, the Commission has no guidance on how to estimate its own error rate.

Or should I say each Director-General can do what he wants to and apparently – to put it mildly – estimates with a lot of optimism?

The Court’s conclusion is: There should have been more reservations. What is yours Mr. Semeta?

Secondly on the opinion of the Commission’s internal auditor:

I have not seen it. Mr. Semeta how useful can it be if it is not published?

The Court tells us that the scope of the opinion is limited to the Commission’s own internal control framework although everybody knows that more than 90% of all errors are identified outside the Commission.

Again, Mr. Semeta, how useful can this opinion be?

My conclusion at this point is that without a substantial revisit addressing the Court’s observations, there is no need for this overall opinion.

4. Increased use of Pre-financings

The term ‘pre-financing’ does not sound like a word politicians can get excited about, but reading what the Court has said made me curious.

The Commission is taking an increased risk by paying out an increased proportion of pre-financings. The justification for these payments comes later – sometimes many years later.

I believe the Lifelong Learning Programme with advance payments of up to 100% per project and 93% of all payments made in 2010 being advance payments is the most depressing example.

Mr. Semeta, please tell me why the Commission wants to take this increased risk? And how do you mitigate this risk?

Was one of the considerations also because a high volume of pre-financings lowers the error rate of the Court as evidenced in the policy areas Internal Policies and External Aid?

5. The financial crisis and the EU Budget

Mr. Semeta, as I already pointed out before, I would like to understand how the EU Budget is exposed to financial risk deriving from the financial crisis affecting Member States.

In your view, where is the EU Budget exposed to such risk?
Which steps do you take to mitigate these risks?
With reference to the table given as answer to the first written question, the total outstanding amounts as of 31 december 2010 were 14,274 billion euro. Which measures has the commission taken to manage the financial risk in relation to this outstanding amount?

SECOND ROUND OF QUESTIONS

RESPONSE TO THE EXPLANATIONS GIVEN BY COURT/COMMISSION OR REPITITION OF QUESTIONS LEFT UNANSWERED

CONCLUDING REMARK

Thank you very much Mrs. Kaljulaid and Commissioner Semeta for your explanations.

I fear that we have to – once again – put all our hopes into the next programming period.

I am asking myself whether the Commission has carefully considered the risk of continued high error rates in Structural funds in the 2014 – 2020 period?

As you are aware, this time the legislative procedure will be different. The Lisbon Treaty has given Parliament full co-decision power for the legislative packages for the Cohesion and Agricultural policies.

I hope Commissioner Semeta that we can count on your full support so that we do not sit here in seven years, listening to you or to your successor explaining to us

- that “progress” has been made and

- that the Commission will ensure that weaknesses will be remedied in the 2021 – 2027 period.

Thank you very much.

I veckan presenterade Europeiska revisionsrätten sin årsrapport om EU:s budget för 2010 inför Europaparlamentet i Strasbourg. Som parlamentets föredragande inledde jag debatten efter revisionsrättens ordförande Caldeira och kommissionär Semeta. Dessa menade att felprocenten i EU:s budget ligger på en stabil nivå också för 2010, och jag svarade att stabilt inte är gott nog. Parlamentet var missnöjt förra året och vi ledamöter kommer att vara missnöjda i år igen. Framförallt uttryckte jag oro över hur felen i sammanhållningspolitiken ökar och hur avancerade så kallade ”financial engineering instruments” för stödsystemen försvårar för kommissionen att ha koll på sina utgifter. Och kanske än mer alarmerande; inom ramen för budgetkrisen har EU utfärdat krisfonder som använder EU-budgeten som finansiell säkerhet, vilket innebär att EU, medlemsländerna och i slutändan skattebetalarna utsätts för stor finansiell risk…

Som ansvarig för parlamentets granskning av budgeten har jag utan tvekan ett långt men intressant arbete framför mig. I detta klipp kan ni se mitt anförande i plenum, och nedan mii pressmeddelande som gick ut från parlamentet.

“Discharge 2010: Cohesion Funds and transparency of Financial Stability Facilities in focus.

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“The Court of Auditors report shows that the situation for error rates remains stable, but stable is not good enough. We were not happy last year so we cannot be happier this year”, says Christofer Fjellner MEP, Parliament’s Rapporteur for the discharge of the Commission for fiscal year 2010.

“Our task is to look for ongoing problems. This year we have to focus on cohesion funds, since error rates have gone up from 5.5 to 7.7 per cent. Last year Parliament did a good job by putting pressure on the Commission to create better systems to suspend and interrupt erroneous payments. This year, we will follow up by working on resumptions of payments after interruptions. How does this work, and how can it be improved?”

“Another main focus will be on Financial Engineering Instruments. My preliminary position is that there currently exists a considerable accountability gap concerning FEIs in the cohesion area and possibly also in other policy areas. The question is really how the Commission can manage and Parliament give discharge on such an uninformed basis. What control does the Commission have over funds in those instruments?”

“And we must not forget the responsibility of Member States. The Court of Auditors concludes that sufficient information was available for Member States to correct 58 per cent of the transactions affected by error”, says Fjellner.

“An additional concern for the audit report will be the current financial and budgetary crisis in Member States that touches on the EU budget. The Auditors underline that there is an increased risk of gaps of accountability and public audit through the establishment of facilities to support some Member States. The two facilities, the balance of payments facility and the European Financial Stability Facility have ceilings of €50 and €60 bn respectively, amounting to a total of €110 bn (in 2010). As payments from the annual EU budget in 2010 amounted to €122 bn this means the EU budget is highly exposed to financial risks potentially amounting to almost one annual budget. This shows how highly leveraged the EU budget currently is. This will definitely be taken into account for this year’s discharge report”, Fjellner concludes.