Resolution

of the European Parliament containing the comments accompanying the decision concerning discharge to the Administrative Board of the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions in respect of the implementation of its budget for the financial year 2001

THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT,

having regard to the Court of Auditors' report on the financial statements of the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions for the financial year 2001, together with the Foundation's replies(1) (C5-0597/2002),

having regard to the Council's recommendation of 7 March 2003 (C5-0089/2003),

having regard to the EC Treaty, and in particular Article 276 thereof,

having regard to Article 16 of Council Regulation (EEC) No 1365/75(2) as amended by Council Regulation (EEC) No 1947/93(3) and having regard to Article 185 of the Financial Regulation of 25 June 2002(4),

having regard to Rule 93a and Annex V of its Rules of Procedure,

having regard to the report of the Committee on Budgetary Control and the opinion of the Committee on Employment and Social Affairs (A5-0079/2003),

A. whereas the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Dublin Foundation) in its work programme of 2001 aimed at developing and implementing fewer and more substantial research programmes, reinforcing the Foundation's role as a forum for debate, developing a coherent and consistent communication strategy, increasing accountability, transparency and cost effectiveness and taking into account important changes in the European Union,

B. whereas on 10 April 2002 Parliament gave discharge(5) to the Administrative Board of the Foundation in respect of the implementation of its budget for the 2000 financial year and, at the same time,

- expressed concern at the volume of appropriations carried over from 2000 to 2001 and urged the Foundation to take steps to ensure better monitoring of the implementation of its budget with the aim of keeping carry-overs and cancellations of appropriations to a minimum;

- called on the Foundation to take steps to ensure that all shortcomings in the accounting systems employed had been remedied in time for the 2001 discharge;

- regretted the fact that in the Foundation continued to make excessive use of imprest accounts;

C. whereas the Court of Auditors has obtained reasonable assurance that the accounts for the financial year ended 31 December 2001 are reliable and the underlying transactions are, taken as a whole, legal and regular;

1. Notes the following figures for the accounts of the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions:

Revenue and expenditure account for the financial years 2001 and 2000

>TABLE>

Source:

Data compiled by the Foundation - These tables summarise the data provided by the Foundation in its own financial statements.

Financial Control

2. Notes that the Court of Auditors takes the view that the carry-over rate for operating appropriations remains too high (EUR 3,5 million) and that the Foundation should do everything possible to reduce the carry-over rate; notes that the new Financial Regulation will provide an improved legal basis for carry-overs; welcomes however the initiatives that the Foundation has taken in order to reduce the level of carry-overs;

3. Notes that the Foundation finds the SI2 computerised budgetary accounting system extremely complex with many faults, weaknesses and instabilities; regrets that the Commission has imposed the SI2 system on the Foundation, which is much too cumbersome and appears over-complicated for the Foundation's requirements; calls on the Commission to ensure that the agency has the required manpower and technical support in order to operate the system;

4. Regrets that the Court found several instances where one and the same person was able to approve the commitments and payments, using the electronic approval system, thus discharging the duties of the manager, the authorising officer, the financial controller and the accounting officer; notes that the Court of Auditors deplores the practice of "super user" rights as incompatible with the principle of the separation of duties; welcomes the assurance by the Foundation that this practice is no longer in use;

5. Regrets that the Foundation has not fully respected the tendering procedures in all its service contracts; recalls that this is not only a violation of the principle of equal treatment but could also result in legal action against the Foundation by disadvantaged tenderers; urges the Foundation to ensure that proper tendering procedures are followed for all contracts;

6. Acknowledges that the Foundation needs more flexible financial procedures; calls on the Foundation to implement the new Financial Regulation as soon as possible and to find an appropriate balance between flexibility and accountability;

External assessment

7. Welcomes the external evaluation and the Draft Action Plan responding to the recommendations made in the evaluation; congratulates the Foundation on the overall very positive appraisal; calls on the Foundation to carry out in the coming years an analysis of the impact of the measures adopted;

8. Notes that the Foundation is meeting most of its deadlines set out in the Action Plan; draws attention to the following points made in the evaluation:

- the need to review and improve cooperation between the Foundation and the Commission as well as the Parliament,

- the need to establish a system to track the use of the Foundation's outputs, and

- the need to introduce more internal quality control processes,

Overall assessment

9. Congratulates the Foundation on the good work carried out by highly qualified staff; would however wish that its good work were known to a wider audience, welcomes the enhanced information efforts; acknowledges that the main role of the organisation is to contribute to the debate at European level and welcomes the steps the Brussels Liaison Office has taken in order to improve contact with the European institutions;

10. Notes that the Foundation has a high share of administrative expenditure (Title 1 and 2 of the budget); notes that in the 2003 budget, it makes up about EUR 10 million; whilst operational expenditure (Title 3) is about EUR 7 million; notes that many of the operating systems in practice at the Commission are imposed on the Foundation even though they are more adapted to the needs of a very large administration rather than a smaller organisation like the Foundation;

11. Asks the Commission to take advantage of the expertise in the Foundation and to consider the cost benefit of outsourcing more of its tasks to the Foundation; calls on the Commission to reconsider creating more executive agencies when the tasks could be given to the existing agencies;

General points concerning the bodies referred to in Article 185 of the Financial Regulation

12. Takes note of the fact that there is an imbalance between administrative and operational expenditure in many Agencies, with administrative expenditure exceeding expenditure for operational purposes;

13. Takes the view that these Agencies should have more operational tasks; they could for example be entrusted with executing Community programmes in the field of education or health thereby avoiding the creation of further executive agencies by the Commission; asks the Commission to make proposals in this respect by 30 June 2003 at the latest and before creating any further executive agencies;

14. Recalls that independent ex ante control of the Agencies by the Financial Controller of the Commission has ceased to exist;

15. Is worried that the absence of outside ex ante verifications of financial operations might increase the risk of irregularities and mismanagement; invites therefore:

- the Court of Auditors to increase the number of checks carried out by its auditors,

- the Agencies to review and modify thoroughly their procedures for implementing their budget in order to counter this risk;

16. Asks the Agencies to bring their procedures for implementing the budget in line with the requirements of the new Framework Financial Regulation(6) as soon as possible and by 1 July 2003 at the latest;

17. Recalls that the Agencies shall adopt their own financial rules, which may not depart from the Framework Financial Regulation except where their specific operating needs so require and with the Commission's prior consent; asks the Court of Auditors to give an opinion on all financial provisions adopted by the Agencies which depart from the Framework Financial Regulation;

18. Underlines in particular the strict segregation of duties between authorising officers and accounting officers and the enhanced role of the latter in:

(a) laying down and validating the accounting systems,

(b) keeping the accounts,

(c) validating systems laid down by the authorising officer to supply accounting information,

(d) cooperating with the Commission's accounting officer,

(e) preparing and presenting the financial statements and the reports on implementation of the budget,

19. Stresses that accounting officers shall be appointed by the management boards of the Agencies on the grounds of particular competence as evidenced by diplomas or by equivalent professional experience; recalls that they shall not be hierarchically subordinated to authorising officers;

20. Asks the Agencies to fully respect the rules for procurement procedures as laid down in the Financial Regulation; stresses that open calls for tenders must be used as much as possible in order to enhance transparency and to ensure equal treatment of potential tenderers;

21. Calls upon the Agencies to monitor closely the granting of leave on personal grounds, in order to ensure that conditions of transparency and separation of interests are met;

22. Recalls that non-respect of public procurement rules is not only potentially detrimental to the financial interests of the Agencies but can also be a criminal offence under the law of Member States;

23. Asks the Court of Auditors to report at the next opportunity on whether the Community bodies duly cooperate with the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) and apply the Interinstitutional Agreement of 25 May 1999 concerning internal investigations by the OLAF(7) unreservedly; also asks the Court of Auditors to evaluate the effectiveness of this cooperation on the basis of the cases processed so far;

24. Notes that the Court of Auditors deplores the practice of "super-user" rights in computerised systems (where one and the same person is able to discharge the duties of the manager, the authorising officer, the financial controller and the accounting officer) as incompatible with the principle of the separation of duties; asks all the Agencies to ensure that such "super-user" rights are no longer attributed;

25. Stresses that computerised systems must guarantee the existence of a complete audit trail for each operation and for any change made to the system so that it is possible at any time to identify the nature of the change and the person who made it;

26. Invites the Commission, with a view to accelerating the efforts towards preparing integration of the future Member States, to make proposals to foster better functioning of these Community bodies, ensuring better value for money through a cost/ benefit analysis, and avoiding any unnecessary proliferation of agencies; such proposals may provide, for bodies entrusted with similar tasks, for the setting-up of common boards;

27. Considers it out of the question, on grounds of efficiency and cost, to expand further the administrative boards of the Community bodies during the forthcoming enlargement; takes the view that enlargement offers a good opportunity to reconsider thoroughly the composition and working methods of these administrative boards, which are already very ponderous as a rule; calls on the Commission to put forward appropriate proposals by 31 July 2003 to amend the constituent acts of Community bodies accordingly and, in so doing, to examine whether provision could be made for common administrative boards for bodies with similar responsibilities;

28. Recalls the Court of Auditors' observation(8) that there is a risk of directors of Community bodies becoming too dependent on the Commission; calls therefore on the Commission to submit by 31 July 2003 an amendment to the constituent acts of the agencies to ensure that the directors of Community bodies may in future be appointed only with the assent of Parliament;

29. nvites the Commission to make an overall study of activities currently deployed by various Community bodies that may overlap or serve the same goals in order to propose appropriate solutions including possible mergers of agencies; notes that the Commission has stated a possible overlap between Cedefop and the ETF in the field of vocational training and between the Foundation for the improvement of Working and Living Conditions and the Agency for Health and Safety and Work(9);

30. Invites the Commission furthermore, in line with its proposal on European governance aimed at concentrating its activity on the core tasks, to include in its action programme the appropriate proposals with a view to ensuring that overlapping between the activities of its services and those of the agencies is avoided.

(1) OJ C 326, 27.12.2002, p. 57.

(2) OJ L 139, 30.5.1975, p. 1.

(3) OJ L 181, 23.7.1993, p. 13.

(4) OJ L 248, 16.9.2002, p. 1.

(5) OJ L 158, 17.6.2002, p. 55.

(6) OJ L 357, 31.12.2002, p. 72.

(7) OJ L 136, 31.5.1999, p. 15.

(8) Opinion 10/2002 of the Court of Auditors on a Commission proposal for amendment of the constituent acts of Community bodies following the adoption of the new Financial Regulation (OJ C 285, 21.11.2002, p. 4).

(9) See working document from DG-budget on the management costs and analytical accounts of the decentralised agencies.