Mr President, I want, today, to express my gratitude to the Court of Auditors for the outstanding quality and considerable quantity of its work. Its numerous individual reports, and now its comprehensive annual report, give us a clear picture of the European Union’s defects and strengths, of its problems and of the attempts made to resolve them. This being the year before the European elections, I would like to reaffirm that the Court’s work can help to qualify the widespread suspicion of the European institutions. Where mistakes have been made, they must be brought to light and corrected. The Eurostat case, in particular, demonstrates how we need greater transparency and less bureaucracy in the European institutions, but your report goes further, using important issues to show the challenges that the European Union faces. Enlargement is one example. The enlargement programmes such as Sapard, are meant to help with the proper functioning, post-enlargement, of the agricultural programmes, the structural programmes and the administrative structures. It is unfortunate that backlogs persist; Sapard’s implementation rate, for example, was higher than in the previous year, but 2% is still a disgracefully low figure. Mr Fabra Vallés, your report, however, also makes reference to structural problems and errors in the European Union’s policies. Let me take the common agricultural policy as an example and quote what your report has to say, which strikes me as very instructive. On the subject of the greening of the common agricultural policy, the Court came to the conclusion that more intensive agricultural production methods had led to environmental problems that were a cause for concern. That is in fact the precise opposite of what we were meant to be achieving by the use of our resources. There are many defects that have to be removed – in the Council Directive and in the environmental criteria – for taxpayers have every right to expect not only a lack of possibilities for fraud, but also that their money will be invested wisely. Responsibility for this lies not only with the Commission and Parliament, but, primarily, with the Council. I would like to refer to an example that you mentioned and which strikes me as highly illuminating, namely the issue of artificially dried animal fodder. Let me quote: ‘The rate of aid paid for artificially dried fodder is almost double that paid for sun-dried fodder. This encouraged producers to switch from sun-drying and to produce artificially dried fodder to the maximum extent possible. EU production has continued to increase since 1995 and the MGQ has been exceeded since 1998/99’. I think that is a scandal that has to be highlighted, and something must be done to ensure that the position changes. Another example, one that I see as equally important, is that of cotton. Generally speaking, the aid arrangements for producers of cotton are intended to support the production of cotton and to make it possible for producers of it to enjoy an adequate standard of living. Although this is a proper objective and one that we can support, it would, I believe, constitute a misuse of funds if the result were to be an increase in cotton production without its effects on the environment being monitored at the same time. We have to consider not only fraud and irregularities, but also the proper use of our money. Let me give another example, that of export refunds, which, in 2002, totalled some EUR 3 622 million, money that I do not think has been used properly, for we keep learning on a daily basis how export refunds lead to irregularities and fraud, quite apart from which, such export refunds are also unjust, because they destroy markets in the developing world. I take the view that, if the European taxpayer is to become willing to keep on making his contribution to the European Union, then the EU’s policies have to be discussed in far greater depth. This not only involves fighting fraud and irregularities, but also this House thoroughly getting to grips with the question of what services we get in return for the money we invest. We have to redefine our objectives, and we have to delve far more deeply in order to evaluate what is being done with these funds in the European Union.

Political group: Verts-ALE