The Committee
on Budgetary Control adopted the report by Véronique MATHIEU (EPP, FR) on
discharge to be granted to the European Police College (CEPOL), calling on
the European Parliament to postpone its decision to grant discharge to the Director
of CEPOL discharge in respect of the implementation of its budget for the
financial year 2008. At the same time, they postpone the closure of CEPOL’s
accounts.
Members
consider that the Court of Auditors had been very critical in regard to
CEPOL’s budgetary and financial management and that, as a general rule,
CEPOL’s responses to the Court had been inadequate. As a result, Members
consider that the discharge authority is not in a position to adequately
determine whether the College is capable of improving in the future.
Members raise
the following issues:
- structural
problems: given the small size of the
College, Members consider that this calls into question its capacity to
handle effectively the complexities of the EU's financial and staff
regulations. Moreover, the College secretariat's location, in Bramshill,
some 70 kilometres from London, is a disadvantage, inter alia as regards
recruitment and public transport links. Overall, Members question
whether the College's new Director will be able to address these
structural problems and wonder whether consideration should not be given
to attaching the College to Europol;
- College
governance and transparency: members note
the College's high fixed governance costs, noting that the College has a
27-member Governing Board and call for a list of board members to be
placed on the website of the College;
- reliability
of the accounts: Members are concerned about
the overall quality of financial information supplied and the fixed
assets management systems. They also regret that no ex post control by
an external company was launched even in mid-2009 (following the Court
of Auditors' findings in the 2007 financial year report that there were
cases of appropriations which were used to finance private expenditure).
Members call on the College to take all the steps needed to ensure that
such a control is carried out as speedily as possible;
- weaknesses
in procurement procedures: noting the number
and serious nature of irregularities in the procedure used for a public
supply contract, Members stress, as in previous years, the need for the
College to strictly abide by the Financial Regulation and EC public
procurement legislation;
- failure
to comply with the rules governing expenditure on courses: Members note the great number of administrative and
financial rules governing expenditure on the organisation of courses and
seminars, which were not followed and the irregularities regarding the
routine organisation of the College. In this regard, they call on the
College to take steps to improve this situation;
- carryover
of appropriations: CEPOL carried 31 % of its
total budget in 2008 and this situation is at odds with the principle of
annuality. For this reason, Members call on the College to introduce a
system of differentiated appropriations in future budgets for grants, so
as to obviate the need for cancellations;
- other
irregularities: Members note the absence of
a legal commitment covering a total of EUR 39 500, budgetary commitments
preceding the legal commitments in nine cases covering a total of EUR
244 200. As a result, the College needs to take steps to improve
this situation and, in the coming years, the discharge for the
implementation of its budget should be further based on its performance
throughout the year;
- ongoing
OLAF investigation: Members recall the OLAF
investigation into the use of public money for private purposes by
members of the College’s staff and are pleased to note that some
information has been obtained. This relates to the fact that the
recovery process has been initiated for the amounts involved. They call
on the College and the Commission to communicate the findings of the
OLAF investigation to the discharge authority without delay;
- human
resources: Members note that it was not
until 2009 that the College issued a vacancy notice for the recruitment
of an Internal Control Standards Coordinator and that the interviews for
that post were then scheduled for early 2010;
- internal
audit: Members call on the College to
implement the recommendations made by the Internal Audit Service (IAS)
in particular in regard to public procurement; management assurance;
fixed assets (inventory system); management of delegations (delegations
must be fully documented and regularly reviewed); budgetary management;
compliance with accounting rules and principles; and the checklist
ensuring consistency and documentation of the financial controls;
- Action
plan: lastly, Members call on the CEPOL to
adopt and implement an action plan to meet the objectives set out in the
annex to this report by 30 June 2010. As a second step, the College's
Director, in cooperation with the IAS and the parent directorate-general
(DG) would have to draft specific measures and a timetable for
implementation of that plan and to submit them to the Governing Board
for adoption. Members call on the College to communicate the specific
measures and indicators adopted to the discharge authority by 30 June
2010, as well as on the Court of Auditors to deliver an opinion in
letter form on the establishment of the College's action plan to the
discharge authority at the earliest opportunity.
In the draft
resolution, Members make a number of general recommendations on financial
management and control of EU agencies - see 2010/2007(INI).