Decision giving discharge in respect of the implementation of the budget for the financial year 1997 Section IV - Court of Justice - Section V - Court of Auditors - Section VI - Part B: Committee of the Regions
Date: 1999-05-04
Institutions: Committee on Budgetary Control, European Parliament
Subjects: Community budget, European Ombudsman, Middle East

1.10.1999

EN

Official Journal of the European Communities

C 279/131

Tuesday 4 May 1999

Decision giving discharge in respect of the implementation of the budget for the financial year 1997
Section IV − Court of Justice; Section V − Court of Auditors; Section VI − Part B: Committee of the
Regions

II.

The European Parliament,

−  having regard to Article 272(10) of the EC Treaty,

−  having regard to Article 22(2) and (3) of the Financial Regulation,

−  having regard to the revenue and expenditure account and the balance sheet for the 1997 financial year

(SEC(98)0521 − C4-0353/98),

−  having regard to the report of the Committee on Budgetary Control (A4-0199/99),

Court of Justice

Notes the significant savings obtained by the conclusion of a supplementary agreement to the leasing
1.
agreement concerning the annexes to the Court building, following the early payment of ECU 50 million
during the previous financial year;

2.
Notes the undertaking by the Luxembourg Government to bear the cost of rehousing the occupants
of the Court building in a replacement office block for the duration of the restoration and extension work
on the Court building, and the cost of removals to the replacement building and of the subsequent return to
the Court building when work is completed;

Repeats  its  call  on  the  Court  of  Justice  to  improve  its  financial  forecasting  (Article  270)  and  the

3.
management of its budgetary resources (Item 1410);

4.
Disapproves  of  the  use  for  the  purchase  of  cars,  following  an  article-to-article  transfer,  of
appropriations intended for computer equipment, which shows inefficient programming of work in the
drafting of the budget;

Court of Auditors

Recalls  that  the  total  number  of  new  posts  authorised  in  1997  and  1998  is  intended  to  guarantee

5.
stability in the establishment plan up to and including the year 2001;

Considers that certain activities (Chapter 15), for which the appropriations allocated were judged
6.
insufficient by the Court of Auditors, could have benefited from the large volume of funds arising partly as
a result of the favourable movement in the ECU-LUF conversion rate, thus helping to reduce the amount
of appropriations cancelled;

Committee of the Regions

7.
Expresses its displeasure at the haphazard programming of the activities of the Committee of the
Regions, which necessitated a major article-to-article transfer at the very beginning of the 1997 financial
year;

Calls  on  the  Committee  of  the  Regions  to  improve  significantly  the  quality  of  its  budgetary
8.
forecasting to enable optimum use to be made of the financial resources allocated to it by the budgetary
authority;

9.
Recalls its request to the Court of Auditors to investigate the appropriateness and effectiveness of the
measures taken by the Committee of the Regions, to ensure that the irregularities identified in the 1996
annual  report  do  not  recur;  requests  on  the  Court  of  Auditors  to  submit  a  report  on  this  matter  by
30 September 1999;

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10.
Gives discharge to the Registrar of the Court of Justice and the Secretaries-General of the Court of
Auditors and the Committee of the Regions in respect of the implementation of their budgets for the 1997
financial year;

Instructs its President to forward this decision to the Institutions and the advisory body concerned

11.
and to arrange for its publication in the Official Journal (L series).