The Committee on Budgetary Control adopted the 2nd report by Ryszard CZARNECKI (ECR, PL) and called on the European Parliament to grant discharge to the Executive Director of the ECSEL Joint Undertaking in respect of the implementation of the budget of the Artemis Joint Undertaking for the financial year 2013.
Members called on Parliament to approve the closure of Artemis’s accounts.
Budgetary and financial management: Members recalled that the Court of Auditors stated that the 2013 annual accounts of the Joint Undertaking presented fairly, in all material respects, its financial position as of 31 December 2013 and the results of its operations and its cash flows for the year-end.
They acknowledged from the Joint Undertaking that the practical arrangements for ex post audits concerning the administrative agreements signed with the national funding authorities (“NFAs”) have been put in place. The Joint Undertaking stated that the 23 NFAs that shared information on their audit strategies represented 95 % of the total grants awarded. Members acknowledged that Artemis had made progress in implementing the action plan aimed at remedying the deficiencies identified by the Court in its qualified opinion.
At the same time, they noted that the Joint Undertaking developed a new methodology for residual error rate estimation, similar to the one used by the Commission services in charge of co-managed funding.
Utilisation rate: Members recalled that the utilisation rate of payment appropriations after the end of year budget amendment was 69 %. The Joint Undertaking stated that the delay in issuing payment certificates by the NFAs was one of the main reasons for the low utilisation rate as the payments were executed without delay as soon as the national certificates were received.
Evaluation of Artemis: Members noted that the Commission would carry out an evaluation to assess the ARTEMIS activity up to the date of the ECSEL JTI creation, as provided for in Council Regulation (EC) No 74/2008 setting up the ARTEMIS Joint Undertaking, to be considered for the discharge for the financial year 2014.
Prevention and management of conflicts of interests and transparency: the report noted that due to the merger with the ENIAC JU, the Comprehensive policy for the prevention and management of conflicts of interests of the ENIAC JU was also applicable to the Joint Undertaking. Furthermore, the procedures for managing situations of conflicts of interests, as well as the mechanism proceedings in the event of a violation of the rules, were part of the adopted policy.
Monitoring and reporting of research results: lastly, Members recalled that the Seventh Framework Programme (FP7) Decision established a monitoring and reporting system related to the protection, dissemination and transfer of research results. They acknowledged from the Joint Undertaking that 211.5 publications and 16.6 patents per EUR 10 million of Union grants showed a high productivity of its research results and that it was compliant with all requests expressed so far by the FP7 coordinators.