Report on the annual accounts of the Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European Union for the financial year 2008, together with the Centre’s replies
Date: 2009-10-08
Institutions: European Court of Auditors
Subjects: European Court of Auditors, Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European Union, administration of the Institutions, financial control, implementation of the budget, powers of the institutions (EU), report








C_2009304EN.01010701.xml










15.12.2009   


EN


Official Journal of the European Union


C 304/107






REPORT

on the annual accounts of the Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European Union for the financial year 2008, together with the Centre’s replies
2009/C 304/20

CONTENTS








 



Paragraph




Page





INTRODUCTION…


1-2


108




STATEMENT OF ASSURANCE…


3-12


108




COMMENTS ON THE BUDGETARY AND FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT…


13-14


109




Table…


110





The Centre’s replies…


111





INTRODUCTION







1.


The Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European Union (hereinafter ‘the Centre’), located in Luxembourg, was established by Council Regulation (EC) No 2965/94 (1). The Centre’s role is to provide the EU bodies, and any other EU Institutions and Bodies which call upon its services, with the translation services necessary for their activities (2).










2.


The Centre’s 2008 budget amounted to 59,9 million euro compared with 46,1 million euro the previous year.The number of staff employed by the Centre at the end of the year was 189 as compared to 176 in the previous year.






STATEMENT OF ASSURANCE









3.



Pursuant to the provisions of Article 248 of the Treaty the Court has audited the annual accounts (3) of the Centre, which comprise the ‘financial statements’ (4) and the ‘reports on implementation of the budget’ (5) for the financial year ended 31 December 2008 and the legality and regularity of the transactions underlying those accounts.











4.



This Statement of Assurance is addressed to the European Parliament and the Council in accordance with Article 185(2) of Council Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 1605/2002 (6).






The Director’s responsibility









5.



As authorising officer, the Director implements the revenue and expenditure of the budget in accordance with the financial rules of the Centre under her own responsibility and within the limits of authorised appropriations (7). The Director is responsible for putting in place (8) the organisational structure and the internal management and control systems and procedures relevant for drawing up final accounts (9) that are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error, and for ensuring that the transactions underlying those accounts are legal and regular.






The Court’s responsibility









6.



The Court’s responsibility is to provide, on the basis of its audit, a statement of assurance as to the reliability of the annual accounts of the Centre and the legality and regularity of the transactions underlying them.











7.



The Court conducted its audit in accordance with the IFAC and ISSAI (10) International Auditing Standards and Codes of Ethics. Those standards require that the Court complies with ethical requirements and plans and performs the audit to obtain reasonable assurance about whether the accounts are free from material misstatement and whether the underlying transactions are legal and regular.











8.



The Court’s audit involves performing procedures to obtain audit evidence about the amounts and disclosures in the accounts and about the legality and regularity of the transactions underlying them. The procedures selected depend on its audit judgement including the assessment of the risks of material misstatement of the accounts or of illegal or irregular transactions, whether due to fraud or error. In making those risk assessments internal control relevant to the entity’s preparation and presentation of accounts is considered in order to design audit procedures that are appropriate in the circumstances. The Court’s audit also includes evaluating the appropriateness of accounting policies used and, the reasonableness of accounting estimates made by management, as well as evaluating the overall presentation of the accounts.











9.



The Court believes that the audit evidence obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for the opinions set out below.







Opinion on the reliability of the accounts










10.



In the Court’s opinion, the Centre’s Annual Accounts (11) present fairly, in all material respects, its financial position as of 31 December 2008 and the results of its operations and its cash flows for the year then ended, in accordance with the provisions of its Financial Regulation.







Opinion on the legality and the regularity of the transactions underlying the accounts










11.



In the Court’s opinion, the transactions underlying the annual accounts of the Centre for the financial year ended 31 December 2008 are, in all material respects, legal and regular.










12.


The comments which follow do not call the Court’s opinions into question.





COMMENTS ON THE BUDGETARY AND FINANCIAL MANAGEMENT







13.


For the year 2008, the budgetary surplus was 11,5 million euro, increasing the accumulated budgetary surplus to 26,7 million euro, of which 15,3 million euro is necessary to cover the still ongoing dispute (12) with the Commission regarding the employer’s pension contributions for staff. The Centre should take the necessary measures to address the continuous increase in its surplus (13).










14.


The 2008 establishment plan provided for 233 posts, 33 more than the 2007 establishment plan. However, in December 2008 only 189 posts (81 %) had been filled with officials and temporary staff. This situation indicates weaknesses in the planning of recruitment procedures.





This report was adopted by the Court of Auditors in Luxembourg at its meeting of 8 October 2009.


For the Court of Auditors

Vítor Manuel da SILVA CALDEIRA


President





Table


Translation Centre for the Bodies of the European Union (Luxembourg)











Areas of Community competence


Competences of the Centre Council Regulation (EC) No 2965/94


Governance


Resources made available to the Centre in 2008

(Data for 2007)



Products and services provided in 2008

(Data for 2007)





The representatives of the Member States’ governments adopted by mutual agreement a declaration concerning the creation, under the aegis of the Commission’s translation departments in Luxembourg, of a Translation Centre for the bodies of the Union, which would provide the necessary translation services for the operation of the bodies and services whose seats were established by the Decision of 29 October 1993.



Objectives

To provide the necessary translation services for the operation of the following bodies:






—


the European Environment Agency;










—


the European Training Foundation;










—


the European Monitoring Centre for Drugs and Drug Addiction,










—


the European Medicines Agency;










—


the Office for Harmonisation in the Internal Market (Trademarks and Designs);










—


the European Police Office (Europol) and the Europol Drugs Unit;




Bodies set up by the Council other than the above may use the Centre’s services. The institutions and bodies of the European Union which already have their own Translation Services may, if need be, call upon the Centre’s services on a voluntary basis.
The Centre plays a full part in the work of the Interinstitutional Translation Committee.



Tasks







—


To make arrangements for cooperation with the bodies and institutions.










—


To participate in the work of the Interinstitutional Translation Committee.







1 –   Management Board


Composition







—


one representative per Member State;










—


two representatives from the Commission;










—


one representative from each body or institution calling upon the Centre’s services.





Task

Adopts the Centre’s annual work programme and annual report.

2 –   Director

Appointed by the Management Board on a proposal from the Commission.

3 –   External audit

Court of Auditors.

4 –   Internal audit

Commission’s internal auditor.

5 –   Discharge authority

Parliament acting on a recommendation from the Council.



Budget

59,94 (46,12) million euro.

Staff at 31 December 2008

233 (200) provided in the establishment plan, of which 189 (176) were occupied.

Allocated to







—


operational tasks: 97 (88)











—


administrative tasks: 92 (88)








Number of pages translated

747 416(732 673)


Number of pages by languages







—


official languages: 742 256(729 286)











—


other languages: 5 160(3 963)






Number of pages per client







—


Bodies 731 944: (496 665)











—


Institutions: 15 472(8 773)





Number of pages translated by freelances: 441 223(226 822)






Source: Information supplied by the Centre.






THE CENTRE'S REPLIES






13.


The Centre is making every effort to resolve this problem, which is mainly linked to the lack of precision in the forecasts for translation requests received from its clients. In mid-2009 the Centre therefore asked its clients to revise their forecasts for 2009, in order to precise the current budget. More importantly, the Centre is currently carrying out a cost analysis in order to improve its price structure. In 2009, after the adoption of the amending budget, the Centre will reimburse the budget surplus of 11,45 million euros to its clients.










14.


Over the years and in 2008 in particular, the lack of office space did not permit to recruit in accordance with the establishment plan. In 2009 the Centre rented supplementary premises to accommodate additional staff. In addition, a new recruitment system has been introduced to make the recruitment procedure more efficient.







(1)  OJ L 314, 7.12.1994, p. 1.

(2)  The Table summarises the Centre’s competences and activities. It is presented for information purposes.

(3)  These accounts are accompanied by a report on the budgetary and financial management during the year which gives inter alia an account of the rate of implementation of the appropriations with summary information on the transfers of appropriations among the various budget items.

(4)  The financial statements include the balance sheet and the economic outturn account, the cash-flow table, the statement of changes in capital and the annex to the financial statements which includes the description of the significant accounting policies and other explanatory information.

(5)  The budget implementation reports comprise the budget outturn account and its annex.

(6)  OJ L 248, 16.9.2002, p. 1.

(7)  Article 33 of Commission Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 2343/2002 of 23 December 2002 (OJ L 357, 31.12.2002, p. 72).

(8)  Article 38 of Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 2343/2002.

(9)  The rules concerning the presentation of the accounts and accounting by the Agencies are laid down in chapter 1 of Title VII of Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 2343/2002 as last amended by Commission Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 652/2008 of 9 July 2008 (OJ L 181, 10.7.2008, p. 23) and are integrated as such in the Financial Regulation of the Centre.

(10)  International Federation of Accountants (IFAC) and International Standards of Supreme Audit Institutions (ISSAI).

(11)  The Final Annual Accounts were drawn up on 16 June 2009 and received by the Court on 10 July 2009. The Final Annual Accounts, consolidated with those of the Commission are published in the Official Journal of the European Union by 15 November of the following year. These can be found on the following website http://eca.europa.eu or http://www.cdt.europa.eu

(12)  Paragraph 10 of the 2005 Report (OJ C 312, 19.12.2006, p. 50).

(13)  Paragraph 7 of the 2006 Report (OJ C 309, 19.12.2007, p. 95).