EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT RESOLUTION of 17 April 1996 refusing discharge to the Commission in respect of the implementation of the European Development Funds for the 1994 financial year (96/380/EC)

THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT,

- Having regard to the EC Treaty,

- Having regard to the fourth ACP-EEC Convention (1),

- Having regard to the balance sheets and revenue and expenditure accounts of the sixth and seventh European Development Funds for the 1994 financial year (COM(95)0180),

- Having regard to the annual report of the Court of Auditors concerning the financial year 1994 and the replies of the institutions (2),

- Having regard to the Statement of Assurance relating to the sixth and seventh European Development Funds for the financial year 1994, together with the relative special report and the replies of the Commission (3),

- Having regard to the recommendations of the Council of 11 March 1996 (C4-0198/96 and C4-0199/96) (4),

- Having regard to the report of the Committee on Budgetary Control and the opinion of the Committee on Development and Cooperation (A4-0096/96),

A. whereas the Court of Auditors was unable to provide a positive statement of assurance on the activities of the sixth and seventh EDFs for the financial year 1994,

1. Shares the Court of Auditors' opinion that the continuing difficulties besetting the Commission's financial management of the European Development Funds can in large part be attributed to the legal framework under which they are managed, in particular the fact that they are not legally Community expenditure and are not managed in accordance with regular budgetary provisions;

2. Reiterates its view that the situation whereby the European Parliament its called upon to reach an annual discharge decision for the EDFs without at the same time possessing either the corresponding budgetary or legislative powers is an anomalous one; believes that, especially in view of the facts coming to light in the current discharge procedure, this situation can no longer be tolerated;

3. Considers that democratic accountability for the expenditure carried out under the European Development Funds is seriously compromised by the legal and financial framework governing them; refuses from now on to be implicated in providing any illusion of accountability through the granting of discharge, or thereby to assume any responsibility for a system for which it cannot legislate;

4. Calls again for the integration of EDF funds into the development cooperation section of the general budget of the European Communities;

5. Reminds the Member States of their prime responsibility in creating the unsatisfactory situation outlined in this resolution;

6. Recognizes the Commission's attempts to improve EDF financial management within the context of the existing legal framework, and encourages it to pursue those improvements; believes however that such improvements can only be of a superficial nature until the legal framework is changed;

7. Deplores the manner in which the Commission subsidized the operations of the Cultural Foundation without proper checks as to the use made of funding, without requiring proper justification of many of the amounts requested and without informing the EDF discharge authority as to serious financial problems as and when they arose; believes that considerable loss to the European taxpayer has occurred as a result;

8. Deplores the Commission's use of public funds totalling ECU 738 606 to wind up the Foundation, pay off its creditors and meet its related staff costs; notes furthermore that the Commission was under no legal obligation to reach this decision, which was therefore of an exclusively political nature; affirms its total disagreement with that decision;

9. Believes that one of the important reasons the Commission was able to behave as it did in the case of the Cultural Foundation was that EDF procedures do not at present ensure transparency or accountability in respect of the discharge authority;

10. Refuses discharge to the Commission in respect of the implementation of the sixth and seventh European Development Funds for the 1994 financial year;

11. Instructs its President to forward this resolution to the Commission, the Council and the Court of Auditors and to have it published in the Official Journal of the European Communities (L series).

The Secretary-General

Enrico VINCI

The President

Klaus HÄNSCH

(1) OJ No L 229, 17. 8. 1991.

(2) OJ No C 303, 14. 11. 1995.

(3) OJ No C 352, 30. 12. 1995, pp. 93 and 97.

(4) OJ No L 68, 19. 3. 1996, pp. 30 and 31.