PURPOSE: presentation of the EU Court of Auditors report on the annual accounts of the European Joint Undertaking for ITER and the Development of Fusion Energy for the financial year 2012, together with the replies of the Joint Undertaking.
CONTENT: in accordance with the tasks conferred on the Court of Auditors by the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, the Court presents to the European Parliament and to the Council, in the context of the discharge procedure, a Statement of Assurance as to the reliability of the annual accounts of each institution, body or agency of the EU, and the legality and regularity of the transactions underlying them, on the basis of an independent external audit.
This audit concerned, amongst others, the annual accounts of the European Joint Undertaking for ITER and the Development of Fusion Energy (F4E).
In the Courts opinion, the annual accounts of the Joint Undertaking fairly present, in all material respects, its financial position as of 31 December 2012 and the results of its operations and its cash flows for the year then ended, in accordance with the provisions of its Financial Regulation and the accounting rules adopted by the Commissions accounting officer.
The Court also considers that the transactions underlying the annual accounts of the Joint Undertaking for ITER and the Development of Fusion Energy for the financial year ended 31 December 2012 are, in all material respects, legal and regular.
The resources available to the Joint Undertaking in 2012 amounted to amounted to EUR 379.5 million of final revenue (payment appropriations), of which 76.5% funded by Community contribution.
The report also makes a series of observations on the budgetary and financial management of the Joint Undertaking, accompanied by the latters response. The main observations may be summarised as follows:
Courts comments:
Joint Undertakings replies:
audits: improvements have been made according to ITER as regards the audits, despite the Courts observations. Progress has also bee made in the implementation of the action plans;
As regards the activities of the Joint Undertaking in 2012, the report refers to the Annual Activity Report 2012 which can be found at http://www.fusionforenergy.europa.eu/