Special Report No 17 // 2015#Commission’s support of youth action teams: redirection of ESF funding achieved, but insufficient focus on results #(pursuant to Article 287(4), second subparagraph, TFEU)
Date: 2015-11-11
Institutions: European Court of Auditors
Subjects: EU employment policy, EU initiative, EU programme, audit, fight against unemployment, labour market, structural unemployment, young worker, youth employment, youth unemployment

EN 

2015 

NO 17

Special Report  Commission’s support  
of youth action teams: 
redirection of ESF funding 
achieved, but insufficient 
focus on results

EUROPEAN
COURT
OF AUDITORS

 
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EN 

2015 

NO 17

Special Report

Commission’s support 
of youth action teams: 
redirection of ESF funding 
achieved, but insufficient 
focus on results

(pursuant to Article 287(4), second subparagraph, TFEU)

Audit team

02

The ECA’s special reports set out the results of its performance and compliance audits of specific budgetary areas or 
management topics. The ECA selects and designs these audit tasks to be of maximum impact by considering the risks 
to performance or compliance, the level of income or spending involved, forthcoming developments and political and 
public interest.

This performance audit was produced by Audit Chamber II — headed by ECA Member Henri Grethen — which specialises 
in structural policies, transport and energy spending areas. The audit was led by ECA Member Iliana Ivanova, supported 
by the head of her private office, Tony Murphy, Mihail Stefanov, attaché, and Peter Borsos, assistant; Emmanuel Rauch, 
head of unit; Valeria Rota, team leader; and Luis De La Fuente Layos, Zhivka Kalaydzhieva and Anna Fiteni, auditors.

From left to right: Z. Kalaydzhieva, M. Stefanov, E. Rauch, I. Ivanova, T. Murphy, L. De La Fuente Layos and P. Borsos.

Contents

03

Paragraph

Glossary

I–VI 

Executive summary

1–18 

Introduction

1–4 

5–7 

8–9 

EU efforts to tackle youth unemployment

The EU’s role in youth employment policy

Youth action teams

10–15 

European Social Fund: situation prior to the 2012/2013 redirection exercise

16–18 

Results of the youth action teams initiative as reported by the Commission

19–22  Audit scope and approach

23–77  Observations

23–44  Assessment of the effectiveness of the Commission’s advisory role

25–37 

Available ESF performance and financial information limited the effectiveness of the Commission’s advisory 
role to youth action teams

38–44 

The Commission’s preparatory activities resulted in generic ‘country fiches’

45–67  Outcome of the youth action teams initiative

46–50 

Youth action teams meetings provided proposals for ESF reprogramming and reallocation in general terms 

51–57 

Youth action teams led to reprogramming and/or reallocation of ESF funds but providing an overall figure is 
difficult

58–61 

The Commission’s assessment of the ESF OP amendments proposed by the Member States focused mainly 
on budgetary aspects

62–67 

Youth action plans prepared with different levels of detail and limited reference to youth action teams in 
the national reform programmes

 
Contents

04

68–77 

The Commission’s monitoring and reporting on the results of the youth action teams initiative 

69–72 

The Commission’s follow‑up of the results of the youth action teams initiative was on the basis of the 
existing ESF monitoring arrangements

73–77 

Shortcomings in the Commission’s reporting on results of the youth action teams initiative

78–86  Conclusions and recommendations

Reply of the Commission

 
Glossary

05

Europe 2020 strategy: The European Union’s 10‑year jobs and growth strategy. It was launched in 2010 to create 
the conditions for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth.

European employment strategy: The European employment strategy was introduced in 1992 by the Treaty of 
the European Union and since then has been the cornerstone of the EU’s employment policy. Its main aim is the 
creation of more and better jobs throughout the EU. It now constitutes part of the Europe 2020 strategy and it is 
implemented through the European Semester.

European Semester: The European Semester is the first phase of the EU’s annual cycle of economic policy 
guidance and surveillance. Each European Semester, the European Commission analyses the fiscal and structural 
reform policies of every Member State, provides recommendations and monitors their implementation. In the 
second phase of the annual cycle, known as the National Semester, Member States implement the policies they 
have agreed.

European Social Fund: The European Social Fund (ESF) aims at strengthening economic and social cohesion 
within the European Union by improving employment and job opportunities (mainly through training measures), 
encouraging a high level of employment and the creation of more and better jobs.

Indicator: A measurable proxy for an objective that will give useful information to assess the degree to which an 
objective is met.

Intervention: Any action or operation, carried out by public authorities or other organisations, regardless of its 
nature (policy, programme, measure or project). Means of intervention employed are grants, loans, subsidised 
interest rates, guarantees, participation in equity and risk capital schemes or other forms of financing.

Managing authority: A managing authority is a national, regional or local public authority (or any other public 
or private body) which has been designated by a Member State to manage an operational programme. Its 
tasks include selecting projects to be funded, monitoring how projects are implemented and reporting to the 
Commission on financial aspects and results achieved.

National reform programme: This is an annual document which is prepared and submitted by each Member State 
presenting the country’s policies and measures to sustain growth and jobs and to reach the Europe 2020 strategy 
targets. The national reform programme is presented in parallel with its stability/convergence programme, which 
sets out the country’s budgetary plans for the coming 3 or 4 years.

Operational programme: An operational programme (OP) sets out a Member State’s priorities and specific 
objectives and how the funding (EU and national public and private co‑financing) will be used during a given period 
(generally 7 years) to finance projects. These projects must contribute to achieve a certain number of objectives 
specified at the level of the OP’s priority axis. An OP is prepared by the Member State and has to be approved by the 
Commission before any payments from the EU budget can be made. OPs can only be modified during the period 
covered if both parties agree.

Priority axis: One of the priorities of the strategy in an operational programme comprising a group of operations 
which are related and have specific measurable goals.

Glossary

06

Programme period: The multiannual framework within which Structural Funds and Cohesion Fund expenditure is 
planned and implemented.

Shared management: A method of implementing the EU budget where the Commission delegates implementation 
tasks to the Member States, while retaining final responsibility1.

‘Youth guarantee’: The ‘Youth guarantee’, adopted by the Council recommendation of 22 April 2013 on 
establishing a ‘Youth guarantee’, should ensure that all young people under the age of 25 receive a good quality 
offer of employment, continued education, an apprenticeship or a traineeship within 4 months of leaving formal 
education or becoming unemployed. The ‘Youth guarantee’ is a crucial structural reform, making institutions work 
better together to provide concrete results for young people.

1  Article 59 of Regulation (EU, Euratom) No 966/2012 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 25 October 2012 on the financial rules applicable to 

the general budget of the Union and repealing Council Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 1605/2002 (OJ L 298, 26.10.2012, p. 1).

Executive  
summary

07

I
Youth unemployment is not a new phenomenon as 
most Member States have faced structural problems 
in integrating young people in the labour market for 
many years, and the youth unemployment rates are 
generally higher than the ones for other age cat‑
egories. The financial and debt crisis exacerbated the 
longstanding problem of the EU’s youth (aged 15‑24) 
unemployment rate. It increased from above 15 % in 
2008 to unprecedentedly high levels of more than 
23 % in 2013 and has reduced in 2014 to just above 
22 %.

II
In December 2011, the Commission presented its 
‘Youth opportunities initiative’, setting out measures 
to address youth unemployment. This built on its 
‘Youth on the move’ flagship initiative and on the 
experience of actions funded through the European 
Social Fund (ESF). At the informal European Coun‑
cil meeting of 30 January 2012, as part of its ‘Youth 
opportunities initiative’, the Commission proposed to 
Member States to develop and implement compre‑
hensive initiatives for youth employment, education 
and skills and introduce youth action plans within 
their national reform programmes.

III
It also proposed to set up youth action teams (YATs) 
bringing together national and Commission experts. 
These action teams should help the eight Member 
States with the highest levels of youth unemploy‑
ment2 to make the best use of EU structural funding 
by directing unallocated funds from the 2007–2013 
programme period to projects that supported job 
opportunities for young people and facilitated access 
to funding by small businesses.

2 

Ireland, Greece, Spain, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Portugal and Slovakia.

Executive summary 

08

IV
The Court assessed whether the redirection (i.e. repro‑
gramming and reallocation) of ESF funding benefited 
from proposals developed in 2012 by the youth action 
teams on how to achieve faster and more effective 
results for young unemployed people through ESF 
spending. The YATs initiative covered almost 10 bil‑
lion euro of ESF funding still available for reprogram‑
ming in the eight Member States concerned.

V
We concluded that youth action teams set up for the 
eight Member States made limited specific proposals 
on how to achieve faster and more effective results 
for young unemployed people. The effectiveness of 
the advisory role of the Commission to the Member 
States in relation to the YATs was limited by the level 
and quality of information available to it on how exist‑
ing ESF or national measures for young unemployed 
 people work on the ground. While the YATs exercise 
led to the reprogramming and reallocation of ESF 
funds (according to data provided by the Commis‑
sion totalling around 1.9 billion euro by June 2013), 
the assessment of the Commission on OP amend‑
ments focused mainly on budgetary aspects rather 
than on the best use of ESF funds. Finally, there were 
shortcomings in how the Commission monitored and 
reported on the results of the YATs initiative until 2014.

VI
The Court recommends that the Commission should:

—  for future initiatives of this kind, take due account 
of the possibilities and constraints given by the 
political and legal context, its specific knowledge 
of and expertise in the area (based on the imple‑
mentation of EU and nationally funded measures) 
and the availability of the required administrative 
and financial resources at EU and Member State 
level;

—  for the 2014‑2020 programme period:

(a)  ensure that future reprogramming requests from 
Member States are triggered by an expectation of 
achieving better results rather than mainly resolv‑
ing difficulties in absorbing EU funds;

(b)  approve the Member States’ requests for OP 

amendments only if the additional results to be 
obtained through the proposed budgetary trans‑
fers can reasonably be achieved;

(c)  require Member States to report in sufficient detail 
both extraordinary transfers within operational 
programmes and changes within priorities in their 
annual implementation reports and present the 
results achieved;

(d)  participate actively in OP monitoring committees 
and encourage Member States to take the appro‑
priate steps where it is clear from its assessment 
of the annual implementation reports that the 
targets will not be met;

—  ensure that minimum plausibility and reliabil‑
ity checks are systematically carried out when 
using data provided by Member States in its 
communications.

Introduction

09

EU efforts to tackle youth 
unemployment

01 
Youth unemployment is not a new 
phenomenon as most Member States 
have faced structural problems in 
integrating young people in the labour 
market for many years, and the youth 
unemployment rates are generally 
higher than the ones for other age 
categories (see Figure 1). The finan‑
cial and debt crisis exacerbated the 
issue with the EU’s youth (aged 15‑24) 
unemployment rate jumping rapidly 
from above 15 % in 2008 to 21 % in 
2010, and again to more than 23 % in 
2012 and 2013, reducing in 2014 to just 
above 22 %.

02 
Within the framework of the European 
employment strategy, the European 
Commission has supported Member 
States in reducing the levels of youth 
unemployment for many years. Moreo‑
ver, in the context of Europe 2020 
strategy, the ‘Youth on the move’ flag‑
ship initiative was launched in Septem‑
ber 2010 and presented a framework 
of policy priorities to reduce youth 
unemployment, with particular focus 
on facilitating the transition from 
education to work and reducing labour 
market segmentation.

1 Unemployment rate by age, 2008‑2014, EU‑28
e
r
u
g
i
F

25 %

20 %

15 %

10 %

5 %

From 15 to 24 years

From 25 to 64 years

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013

2014

Source: Eurostat, ‘Total unemployment — Labour Force Survey series — Unemployment rates by sex, age and nationality (%)’, 
update 28.9.2015.

 
Introduction

10

03 
On 20 December 2011, the Commission 
launched the ‘Youth opportunities 
initiative’3 (YOI), calling for immediate 
action to be taken in 2012 and 2013, 
both by Member States and the Com‑
mission. The EU’s aim was to support 
Member States in improving the 
employment and educational situation 
of young people by reviewing their 
policies and performance in the con‑
text of the European Semester surveil‑
lance process, and by mobilising the 
EU Structural Funds, in particular the 
European Social Fund (ESF), for actions 
aiming at reducing levels of youth 
unemployment.

The EU’s role in youth 
employment policy

05 
The primary responsibility for tackling 
youth unemployment policy lies with 
Member States, at national, regional 
and local levels. According to the Trea‑
ty on the Functioning of the European 
Union, Member States and the EU have 
to develop a coordinated strategy for 
employment, in particular for promot‑
ing a skilled, trained and adaptable 
workforce and labour markets respon‑
sive to economic change5.

3  COM(2011) 933 final of 

20 December 2011 ‘Youth 
opportunities initiative’.

4  Council recommendation of 
22 April 2013 on establishing 
a ‘Youth guarantee’ (OJ C 120, 
26.4.2013, p. 1).

5  Article 145 of the TFEU (OJ 
C 326, 26.10.2012, p. 112).

6  Article 147 of the TFEU (OJ 
C 326, 26.10.2012, p. 112).

7  Article 148 of the TFEU (OJ 
C 326, 26.10.2012, p. 112).

04 
In April 2013, following a Commission 
proposal, the Council recommended 
the Member States to provide a ‘Youth 
guarantee’, to the effect that they 
would ensure that all young people 
under the age of 25 received a good–
quality offer of employment, con‑
tinued education, an apprenticeship 
or a traineeship within 4 months of 
leaving formal education or becoming 
unemployed4.

06 
The EU’s role in employment policy 
is to coordinate the Member States’ 
employment policies and also to sup‑
port and, if necessary, complement 
their action. Moreover, the objective of 
a high level of employment has to be 
taken into account in the formulation 
and implementation of EU policies and 
activities6.

07 
In the context of the European em‑
ployment strategy, reinforced since 
2011 by the European Semester of eco‑
nomic governance, the Commission 
also has a role in proposing country‑
specific recommendations to the 
Council, which concern inter alia the 
employment policies of the Member 
States7.

11

8 

European Council ‘Statement 
of the Members of the 
European Council’ 
30 January 2012; Presentation 
of J.M. Barroso, ‘Growth and 
jobs: next steps’ to the 
informal European Council of 
30 January 2012; COM MEMO 
12/100, 14 February 2012.

Introduction

Youth action teams

08 
At the informal European Council 
meeting of 30 January 2012, as part 
of the YOI, the Commission proposed 
that Member States develop and 
implement comprehensive initiatives 
for youth employment, education and 
skills, and introduce youth action plans 
into their national reform programmes. 
The Commission also put forward the 
idea of setting up youth action teams 
(YATs), to help the eight Member 
States with the highest levels of youth 
unemployment to mobilise EU fund‑
ing — including from the ESF — that 
was still available under the 2007‑2013 
programme period to support job op‑
portunities for young people and help 
SMEs access funds8 (see Box 1).

1
x
o
B

Mandate and composition of the youth action teams

The youth action teams initiative was launched with the aim of targeting unallocated EU funding and expert‑
ise to deliver faster and more effective results. Each team had to work with the national partners on targeted 
actions to combat youth unemployment and help the SMEs to get access to loan and grant financing. The 
experts were to have a fresh look at the use of Structural Funds and utilise the Commission’s knowledge of 
good practice in different Member States in order to help national authorities reallocate funds to projects that 
would make the ’biggest difference in the shortest time’9.

The YATs were composed of experts from the competent national authorities and from the Commission’s 
Directorates‑General for Regional and Urban Policy, Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion, Education and 
Culture, and Economic and Financial Affairs. They were coordinated by representatives from the prime min‑
isters’ offices in the Member States and the Secretariat‑General of the Commission under the authority of its 
President.

9  Commission Memo/12/100, 14.2.2012.

 
Introduction

09 
The YATs initiative focused on the 
eight Member States having rates of 
youth unemployment of around 30 % 
or above at the end of 2011: Ireland, 
Greece, Spain, Italy, Latvia, Lithu‑
ania, Portugal and Slovakia. Member 
States were selected on the basis of 
youth unemployment rates. While the 
European Council has requested the 
Commission to work as a first step 
with those Member States which have 

the highest youth unemployment 
levels to redirect available EU funds 
towards support for young people to 
get into work or training10, no con‑
sideration was given by the Commis‑
sion to the ESF funding available for 
reprogramming when selecting the 
eight Member States (see Table 1). The 
action teams were set up in Febru‑
ary 2012 and they held meetings in the 
eight Member States between 14 and 
28 February 2012 (see Figure 2).

12

10  European Council, ‘Statement 

of the Members of the 
European Council’, 
30 January 2012.

dates of meetings, youth unemployment rate, number of youths unemployed

2 Youth action teams meetings in 2012 in the eight Member States:  
e
r
u
g
i
F

Dates of YATs meetings

Youth unemployment rate (%, Nov. 2011)

Youth unemployment — persons (thousand, Nov. 2011)

EU 28 youth unemployment: 

Rate: 22.5 %
Persons: 5 505 thousand

21/02/2012
29.2
68

16/02/2012
28.3
30

14-15/02/2012
29.2
36

24/02/2012
34.4
154

24/02/2012
35.3
154

22/02/2012
46.6
899

22/02/2012
33.9
601

28/02/2012
48.3
158

Source: Eurostat: Youth employment figures. Commission: Dates of the YATs meetings.

 
13

11  Article 2 of Regulation (EC) 

No 1081/2006 of the European 
Parliament and of the Council 
of 5 July 2006 on the European 
Social Fund and repealing 
Regulation (EC) 1784/1999 (OJ 
L 210, 31.7.2006, p. 12).

12  See Article 17(1) TEU; Article 
317 TFEU; Article 53(1) of 
Regulation (EU, Euratom) 
No 966/2012.

13  Article 67 of Council 

Regulation (EC) No 1083/2006 
of 11 July 2006 laying down 
general provisions on the 
European Regional 
Development Fund, the 
European Social Fund and the 
Cohesion Fund and repealing 
Regulation (EC) No 1260/1999. 
(OJ L 210, 31.7.2006, p. 25).

14  Article 68 of Council 

Regulation (EC) No 1083/2006.

15  Article 64 of Council 

Regulation (EC) No 1083/2006.

Introduction

European Social Fund: 
situation prior to the 
2012/2013 redirection 
exercise

10 
The ESF regulation stipulates that 
it shall contribute towards the EU’s 
priorities as regards strengthening 
economic and social cohesion by 
improving employment and job op‑
portunities, encouraging a high level 
of employment with more and better 
jobs11.

11 
The ESF operates under shared man‑
agement, with the Commission bear‑
ing the ultimate responsibility for the 
implementation of the EU budget12. 
The Fund is implemented through 
national and regional multiannual op‑
erational programmes (OPs) prepared 
by the Member States and approved 
by the Commission. Within each OP, 
total available funds are broken down 
among the different priority axes of 
the OP.

12 
During the programme period, before 
closure of the programmes, in circum‑
stances requiring departure from the 
original goals set in the programme 
and in accordance with the regula‑
tions, the Member States or the Com‑
mission in agreement with the Mem‑
ber States may change the distribution 
of the unused funds from one priority 
to another. This redirecting can take 
the form of a transfer:

 ο

between OPs (for example be‑
tween two ESF OPs or between 
an ESF and a European Regional 
Development Fund (ERDF)/Cohe‑
sion Fund OP);

 ο

between priority axes of a given 
OP; or

 ο within two different sub‑parts of 

a given priority axis.

13 
The first two cases are ‘reprogram‑
ming’, and require a Commission 
decision to amend the OP. For the 
third case, referred to in this report as 
‘reallocation’, the transfer may also be 
made on the basis of a Commission 
decision or performed by the Member 
State itself within the flexibility of the 
priority axis concerned. In the latter 
case, the managing authority would 
have to be asked to assess the budget 
reallocation involved.

14 
Furthermore, the Commission per‑
forms a supervisory role over the 
monitoring framework and it is also 
responsible for checking that the OPs 
have delivered the expected outputs 
and results. In practice, as part of its 
monitoring responsibility, the Commis‑
sion reviews the annual implementa‑
tion reports prepared by the managing 
authorities13 and holds annual exami‑
nation meetings with the managing 
authorities to examine the progress 
made in the implementation of the 
operational programmes, with a view 
to improving them14. The Commission 
also participates in the work of the 
monitoring committees in an advisory 
capacity15.

Introduction

14

15 
The ESF budget for the 2007‑2013 pro‑
gramme period amounted to 76 bil‑
lion euro (more than 10 billion euro 
per year) and it was allocated through 
117 operational programmes across 
the 27 Member States at the time. 
However, by the end of 2011, Member 
States still had 22 billion euro in ESF 
funds which had not been committed 
to concrete activities. Of this almost 
10 billion euro in unallocated ESF 
funds were available for the YATs in the 
eight Member States with the high‑
est youth unemployment rates (see 
Table 1).

1 Unallocated ESF funds for the eight YATs Member States at 
e
l
b
a
T

the launch of the YATs initiative

Member State

Amount 
(million euro)

Italy

Spain

Portugal

Greece

Lithuania

Slovakia

Ireland

Latvia1

Total of the 8 Member States

Other Member States

Total unallocated ESF

1  For Latvia, there were no unallocated ESF funds available.

Source: Commission estimate at the end of 2011.

Share of total 
unallocated ESF 
(EU-27)

3 674

2 712

1 760

1 495

289

39

2

0

9 971

12 300

22 271

16.5 %

12.2 %

7.9 %

6.7 %

1.3 %

0.2 %

0.0 %

0.0 %

44.8 %

55.2 %

100.0 %

 
18 
In March 2014, the Commission issued 
its most recent publication focusing 
on ESF redirection16. According to this, 
ESF resources reprogrammed and/
or reallocated to specific actions for 
youth amounted to around 4.2 bil‑
lion euro17, of which 1.8 billion euro 
had been committed to projects which 
were ongoing at that time in the Mem‑
ber States. Around 1.2 million young 
people were likely to benefit from this 
support (see paragraphs 51 to 56).

15

16  European Commission 
Directorate‑General for 
Employment, Social Affairs 
and Inclusion, ’Youth 
employment initiative and the 
European Social Fund, 
European Social Fund 
thematic paper’, March 2014.

17  The ESF resources reported by 
the Commission include, for 
Italy, a reallocation of national 
funds to measures combating 
youth unemployment which 
was made possible via the 
reduction of the national 
co‑funding rate for ESF and 
ERDF OPs. The financial 
resources then released of 
more than 1.5 billion euro 
were invested within 
a nationally funded cohesion 
action plan, in a series of 
initiatives, including several 
benefiting young unemployed 
people.

Introduction

Results of the youth 
action teams initiative   as 
reported by the 
Commission

16 
In its update to the Council in 
March 2013, the Commission outlined 
that targeted investment from the EU 
structural funds can have a powerful 
impact on growth and employment. 
The aim of the action teams was to 
maximise the impact of EU structural 
funding by directing the funds still to 
be allocated for the 2007‑2013 period 
to projects directly supporting young 
people and SMEs. At the start of the 
exercise in 2012, it was estimated that 
around 82 billion euro of EU structural 
funds were still to be allocated for the 
budgetary period 2007‑2013 across the 
EU.

17 
This included around 30 billion euro 
for the eight Member States where ac‑
tion teams were created. According to 
the document, the work of the teams 
has contributed by the beginning of 
2013 to a mobilisation in each of the 
eight Member States of this fund‑
ing totalling 16 billion euro. It added 
that this funding would help around 
780 000 young people and 55 000 
SMEs as well as supporting other 
growth‑enhancing measures.

16

18 

Ireland: OP Human Capital 
Investment; Greece: OP 
Education and Lifelong 
Learning and OP Human 
Resources Development; 
Spain: OP Navarra Region; 
Italy: OP Sicily Region; 
Lithuania: OP Human 
Resources Development; 
Portugal: OP Human Potential; 
Slovakia: OP Employment and 
Social Inclusion (see Table 1).

19  ECA Special Report No 3/2015 
‘EU Youth Guarantee: first 
steps taken but 
implementation risks ahead’ 
(http://eca.europa.eu).

Audit scope  
and approach

19 
Through this audit the Court assessed 
whether the redirection of ESF funding 
benefited from proposals developed 
in 2012 by the youth action teams on 
how to achieve faster and more ef‑
fective results for young unemployed 
people through ESF spending. The 
audit scope was limited to ESF‑related 
actions within the YATs initiative and 
excluded those from other sources 
including in particular the ERDF. We 
examined whether:

 ο

 ο

the Commission, through the 
knowledge and information avail‑
able for existing ESF youth em‑
ployment initiatives and measures 
and/or its knowledge of good 
practice in other Member States, 
had effectively fulfilled the advis‑
ory role envisaged in this initiative;

the YATs initiative had resulted in 
the Member States making pro‑
posals for a significant and tar‑
geted reprogramming of the funds 
available under the 2007‑2013 ESF 
operational programmes (or by 
reallocating funds within the OP 
priority axis) and the proposals 
had been assessed by the Commis‑
sion in line with the objectives of 
the YATs initiative;

 ο

adequate arrangements were 
established by the Commission to 
report on the follow‑up of the YATs 
initiative.

20 
Our audit covered the period 
2012 to 2014 and focused on the Com ‑
mission’s contribution to the YATs 
initiative. In particular it included:

 ο

 ο

a review of the information which 
the Commission had in 2012 con‑
cerning ESF measures in favour of 
young unemployed people and 
the respective performance of 
these measures;

a review of the reprogramming 
made within 12 months after 
the YATs meetings for the 60 ESF 
operational programmes of the 
eight Member States concerned by 
the YATs initiative, and a detailed 
examination of the amendments 
for a sample of eight OPs18 and the 
related Commission assessment;

 ο

an analysis of the Commission’s 
monitoring and reporting on the 
results of the YATs until the end of 
2014.

21 
Evidence was obtained from docu‑
mentary reviews and interviews with 
the Commission, and a survey was 
addressed to the relevant Commission 
departments involved in the YATs exer‑
cise with regard to ESF funding.

22 
In March 2015 we published a first 
report concerning the issue of youth 
unemployment, namely on the EU 
‘Youth guarantee’19.

Observations

17

20  Article 10 of Regulation (EC) 

No 1081/2006. 
Articles 66 to 68 of Council 
Regulation (EC) No 1083/2006. 
Annex XVIII to Commission 
Regulation (EC) No 1828/2006 
of 8 December 2006 setting 
out rules for the 
implementation of Council 
Regulation (EC) No 1083/2006 
laying down general 
provisions on the European 
Regional Development Fund, 
the European Social Fund and 
the Cohesion Fund and of 
Regulation (EC) No 1080/2006 
of the European Parliament 
and of the Council on the 
European Regional 
Development Fund (OJ L 371, 
27.12.2006, p. 1).

21  Annex XXIII to Commission 

Regulation (EC) No 1828/2006.

Assessment of the 
effectiveness of the 
Commission’s advisory 
role

Available ESF performance 
and financial information 
limited the effectiveness of 
the Commission’s advisory 
role to youth action teams

23 
The YATs initiative was launched with 
the expectation that the Commission, 
through an advisory role, would help 
the national/regional authorities in the 
eight Member States reallocate ESF 
funding to projects that would make 
the biggest difference in the short‑
est time (see Box 1). In particular, the 
Commission’s experts were tasked 
to work with the national author‑
ities and national social partners on 
targeted actions to combat youth 
unemployment.

24 
Therefore, we examined:

 ο

the performance and financial 
information available to the Com‑
mission on ESF measures for young 
unemployed people; and

 ο

the preparatory action of the Com‑
mission prior to the YATs meetings.

Performance information

25 
The performance‑related information 
available to the Commission regarding 
ESF employment measures implement‑
ed by Member States derived from 
regular monitoring and evaluation 
activities at national level. The manda‑
tory minimum reporting obligations 
of Member States to the Commission 
were set out in the regulations20. This 
reporting was generally at the level of 
the priority axis under the OP. In addi‑
tion, Member States were requested 
by the Commission to provide ad hoc 
information on a voluntary basis.

26 
Monitoring the performance of a spe‑
cific measure or project was the re‑
sponsibility of the managing authority 
in the Member State. The Commission 
gathered and reviewed this monitor‑
ing and evaluation data on an ongoing 
basis for individual Member States. 
During the 2007‑2013 programme 
period, Member States also had a large 
discretion as to how they report  
aggregate performance information 
to the Commission. The regulation 
prescribed only one mandatory type 
of indicator, which was output data 
for participants21. With reference to 
young people, Member States were for 
example only required to monitor and 
report annually on the number of par‑
ticipants in ESF measures for people 
between 15 and 24 years of age. There 
were no result indicators specified in 
the regulations.

Observations

18

Complementary ad hoc survey

22  The 2014 ESF Expert 

30 
In 2010, the Commission carried out 
an exercise to examine ‘with Member 
States the ESF interventions targeting 
youth and to increase awareness and 
maximise the potential of the ESF to 
support young people’24. This exercise 
aimed at identifying ‘good practices’ 
for an efficient use of ESF money in 
order to increase youth employment 
opportunities and inspire the applica‑
tion of these practices more widely in 
the Member States’ programmes (see 
paragraph 25).

31 
To this end, the Commission surveyed 
ESF managing authorities in all Mem‑
ber States. On the basis of the replies 
received, the Commission prepared 
a report which it defined as ‘an initial 
step in identifying some of the meas‑
ures and approaches that are being 
developed within the ESF, which 
provide effective support to young 
people in acquiring relevant education 
and training and in finding employ‑
ment and an active role in society25’.

Evaluation Network report on 
main ESF achievements in 
2007‑2013 concludes that 
‘Although comprehensive 
data are available on outputs 
for each of the Member States, 
the position for results is much 
less favourable. Even for three 
key results — job entry, 
qualifications achieved and 
self‑employment — it was not 
possible to obtain the 
absolute numbers on 
a consistent basis for a number 
of Member States. In the 
absence of absolute numbers, 
it is not possible to generate 
aggregate figures across 
Member States for the results 
associated with ESF‑
supported interventions’ 
(paragraph 5 of the Executive 
Summary).

23  ECA Special Reports 

No 3/2000, No 12/2001, 
No 1/2006, No 17/2009 and 
No 25/2012 (http://eca.europa.
eu).

24  COM(2010) 477 final of 

15 September 2010 ,‘Youth on 
the move: an initiative to 
unleash the potential of young 
people to achieve smart, 
sustainable and inclusive 
growth in the European 
Union’, p. 16.

25  European Commission 
Directorate‑General for 
Employment, Social Affairs 
and Inclusion ‘The European 
Social Fund: giving young 
people a better start in life’, 
December 2011.

27 
The 2014 ESF Expert Evaluation Net‑
work report on the main ESF achieve‑
ments in 2007‑2013 also noted that on 
the basis of the existing arrangements 
it was not possible for them to obtain 
meaningful data on the results of 
the ESF interventions in the Member 
States22.

28 
Moreover, there are weaknesses as 
regards the quality and reliability of 
the ESF performance information 
generally reported by the Member 
States to the Commission, as noted by 
the Court in previous reports23. The 
Internal Audit Service of the Commis‑
sion in its December 2013 report on 
Directorate‑General for Employment, 
Social Affairs and Inclusion perfor‑
mance measurement systems raised 
similar issues.

29 
On the basis of the monitoring in‑
formation reported by the Member 
States, the Commission generally 
did not know which activities had 
proved effective in the past in achiev‑
ing the target objective of getting 
young people to work. As a result, the 
Commission was not in a position to 
easily identify ‘lessons learnt’ or ‘good 
practices’ (i.e. which ESF measures — 
whose effectiveness had been proven 
in the past — could have been rapidly 
launched with or without reprogram‑
ming and which existing measures 
should have been adapted because 
they did not work or because they 
were not a priority).

19

26  Annex IV to Council 

Regulation (EC) No 1083/2006.

Observations

32 
This report is informative in that it 
contains numerous examples of meas‑
ures implemented across the Member 
States. However, there is no analysis 
made in the report as to which ESF 
measure should be considered ‘good 
practice’. In particular, no reference is 
made to the effectiveness and effi‑
ciency of the interventions in terms of 
actual measurable results achieved for 
young people.

33 
The report also includes annexes 
containing an overview of the finan‑
cial allocation and implementation of 
the various operational programmes, 
as well as the number of participants. 
This information was provided by the 
Member States on a voluntary basis. 
The Commission’s disclaimer to the 
effect that ‘these data are neither 
comprehensive, nor fully comparable’ 
illustrates the weaknesses in this type 
of data available to the Commission 
on the implementation of the ESF (see 
paragraphs 25 to 29).

Financial information

34 
For the purpose of the specific YATs 
exercise the Commission should 
have had at its disposal a sufficiently 
detailed overview of the amounts 
that were potentially available for 
reprogramming and/or reallocation to 
support job opportunities for young 
people. Therefore, we assessed the 
extent to which such information was 
available to facilitate the Commission’s 
preparation of the YATs meetings. Such 
information was not readily available 
to the Commission and therefore it 
needed to establish agreed estimates 
with the Member States concerned.

35 
As regards financial information, one 
of the difficulties lies with the fact that 
the ESF financial monitoring system 
for the 2007‑2013 programming period 
does not allow for funding to be dir‑
ectly linked to specific target groups 
(such as young unemployed people). 
The expenditure categories foreseen 
by the legal framework have been 
designed by type of intervention, such 
as ‘implementing active and preven‑
tive measures on the labour market’ 
instead of being classified by target 
group such as for example ‘young 
people’ or ‘older workers’26.

36 
Information on ESF funding potentially 
available for reprogramming/realloca‑
tion is monitored at national level by 
the managing authorities. The Com‑
mission has however agreed in the ESF 
Technical Working Group with Member 
States that they voluntarily report their 
financial execution on the ground for 
each OP on a quarterly basis. Our audit 
showed that this quarterly financial 
reporting was not harmonised: in 
particular, Member States reported on 
the basis of their national definitions 
of the terms ’unallocated’ or ’uncom‑
mitted’. Indeed, these definitions stem 
from a variety of accounting practices 
across the Member States. As a result 
the Commission did not necessarily 
have the most accurate information 
on financial implementation at its 
disposal.

20

27  COM MEMO 12/100, 
14 February 2012.

28  For example, using the regular 
and systematic assessment 
carried out by the European 
Centre for the Development of 
Vocational Training (Cedefop) 
on medium‑ and long‑term 
skills forecasting at EU level, 
broken down by sector, 
occupations, level of 
qualification and countries or 
the ongoing research of 
International Labour 
Organisation and European 
Foundation for the 
Improvement of Living and 
Working Conditions 
(Eurofound).

Observations

37 
In this regard, we found significant 
inconsistencies for Slovakia between 
the aggregate estimates published by 
the Commission for unallocated funds 
and the data used in the context of the 
YATs exercise (see Box 2).

 ο

analysed potential changes to 
the implementation of the pro‑
grammes (such as adjustments to 
eligibility and selection criteria) so 
as to improve the effectiveness of 
the ESF measures.

The Commission’s 
preparatory activities 
resulted in generic ‘country 
fiches’

38 
In February 2012, the Commission an‑
nounced that its experts were ‘ready 
to go on the ground and work with the 
specific situation and needs of each 
country’27. We assessed whether the 
Commission, on the basis of its surveil‑
lance of the Member States’ employ‑
ment policies, had, prior to the YATs 
meetings with the national authorities:

 ο

 ο

 ο

analysed the needs and/or chal‑
lenges that specific groups of 
young people faced when entering 
the labour market;

examined employers’ current and 
future skills requirements28;

identified how ESF interventions 
could contribute towards fulfilling 
some of these needs; and

39 
In order to prepare effectively for 
the YATs meetings the Commission’s 
Secretariat‑General prepared a tem‑
plate (known as the ‘country fiche’) 
which was circulated for completion 
by all directorates‑general (DGs) which 
would be involved with the youth ac‑
tion teams (see Box 1). In this context 
the Directorate‑General for Employ‑
ment, Social Affairs and Inclusion was 
tasked to provide an analysis of the 
main causes of high youth unemploy‑
ment for each of the eight Member 
States and the groups of young people 
particularly affected by it. It was also 
requested to examine the need to 
refocus available EU funding on youth 
in the context of ESF operational pro‑
gramme implementation, to identify 
which short‑term ESF measures could 
help and to look at the possibilities for 
fast implementation. The completed 
‘country fiches’ were consolidated 
by the Secretariat–General and sent 
to the Member States prior to the 
meeting.

2
x
o
B

Example of inconsistencies in information provided on funds available

In November 2011, for Slovakia, the Commission estimated 39 million euro of available ESF funds, whereas, fol ‑
lowing the Commission’s visit in February 2012 to the Member State in question, 422 million euro of ESF funds 
were available. While higher estimates are plausible due to the time lags inherent in the reporting system, this 
cannot be the case for the lower figure.

 
42 
Moreover, our audit showed that the 
analyses provided by the Commission 
which contributed to the elaboration 
of the ‘country fiches’ contained vague 
statements such as ’we need to de‑
velop urgently the skills that are or will 
be needed in the labour market’31 or 
’the training should be strictly related 
to both current and mid‑term labour 
market needs, in priority economic 
sectors’32.

43 
As regards the short‑term measures 
to fight youth unemployment, which 
could be supported by the ESF, we 
noted that the ‘country fiches’ were 
very general and not time‑bound. 
They could refer to any Member State, 
particularly in the absence of a de‑
tailed analysis of labour market needs 
(see Box 3).

21

29  For example, the ‘country 
fiche’ for Ireland identified 
amongst the groups of young 
people mostly affected by 
unemployment those under 
35 (without tertiary 
education); the ‘country fiche’ 
for Spain referred to ESF 
measures targeted to 
unemployed aged 25 or over; 
and the ‘country fiche’ for 
Portugal referred also to the 
age range of 25‑29.

30  Eurostat’s analysis of 

employment data shows 
a negative relationship 
between the unemployment 
rate and job vacancies, 
illustrating the job‑matching 
functions well (‘Beveridge 
curve’). This was the case for 
EU‑27 Member States until the 
first quarter of 2010. 
Afterwards, an increase in 
vacancies did not have any 
effect on unemployment 
rates. Source: Eurostat, ‘Skills 
mismatches and labour 
mobility’, 28.5.2013.

31 

Internal documents of the 
Directorate‑General for 
Employment, Social Affairs 
and Inclusion: 'Draft working 
paper for YOI', 
8 February 2012); 
'Modernisation of public 
employment service and 
active labour market policies 
in Spain', October 2011, p. 9.

32 

’Assessment of youth‑oriented 
activities in Latvia’, document 
delivered by 
Directorate‑General for 
Employment, Social Affairs 
and Inclusion to the Court in 
the context of this audit.

Observations

40 
Our analysis of the ‘country fiches’ 
showed that they provided a general 
overview of the causes of high unem‑
ployment at Member State level (e.g. 
job instability due to labour market 
segmentation, drop‑outs, long‑term 
unemployment amongst young 
people, skills mismatches, an absence 
of job vacancies due to the higher 
unemployment rate, the economic 
crisis, etc.). In its ‘country fiches’, the 
Commission did, to a certain extent, 
identify the groups of young people 
particularly affected by unemploy‑
ment by age and partly by level of 
education (i.e. ’less skilled/less quali‑
fied’). Despite the fact that the Euro‑
stat standard measurement for youth 
unemployment covers the population 
in the age range of 15‑24, we found 
that there was a varying degree of de‑
tail and little uniformity in the analysis 
included in the ‘country fiches’ regard‑
ing the age range of what constitutes 
a ‘young person’29. Moreover, the 
analysis did not cover the scale of the 
problem for young people according 
to gender, geographical location and/
or type of disadvantages (e.g. immi‑
grants, marginalised minorities, etc.).

41 
The Commission’s ‘country fiches’ 
also did not include any analysis of 
the trends in skills and labour market 
needs by country and by sector, de‑
spite the fact that a good understand‑
ing of the employer’s needs is crucial 
to reduce a skills mismatch. An analysis 
of the sectors showing a potential 
increase in labour demand could have 
been particularly helpful in a situation 
where high unemployment coexists 
with increasing difficulties in filling 
vacancies, as was the case for the EU 
Member States from 2010 onwards. 
This would have facilitated the redirec‑
tion of training towards sectors with 
greater job capacity30.

Observations

22

3
x
o
B

Examples of generic measures mentioned in the ‘country fiches’

The Commission suggested that Ireland should ‘enhance targeted active labour‑market policies for youth with 
an emphasis on tailor‑made career guidance, counselling and job search activities’, ‘intervene rapidly, by offer‑
ing further education, (re)training or activation measures …’ or ‘speed up labour market transitions for young 
people’.

For Portugal, it suggested measures aimed at young unemployed persons, such as ‘traineeships and retraining 
and guidance in areas/professions relevant for labour market needs’.

44 
While the ‘country fiches’ did identify 
the groups of young people particu‑
larly affected by unemployment, the 
proposed ESF interventions therein did 
not always target them specifically. For 
example, in Italy, young people with 
a ’high and medium education’ were 
found to be in particular difficulty. 
However, the main initiative identified 
in the ‘country fiche’ involved the re‑
programming of available funds from 
regional ESF OPs (311 million euro for 
2012) to the national OP on education, 
which mostly addresses primary and 
secondary schools. This choice was 
mainly motivated by the objective of 
maximising financial absorption. Ap‑
prenticeship contracts and tax credit 
mechanisms were also suggested as 
possible interventions, without any 
evidence that these would be the best 
instruments to be used in Italy for 
highly qualified people, in view of its 
labour market situation.

Outcome of the youth 
action teams initiative

45 
In order to assess the outcome of the 
YATs initiative, we examined whether:

 ο

 ο

 ο

 ο

the YATs meetings resulted in spe‑
cific proposals for faster and more 
effective ESF measures to reduce 
levels of youth unemployment;

there are estimates of the amounts 
of ESF funds reprogrammed or 
reallocated as a result of the YATs 
meetings;

the Commission assessed the 
effectiveness of OP amendments 
proposed by Member States fol‑
lowing the YATs meetings;

the Commission’s invitation to 
prepare youth action plans in 
accordance with the outcome of 
the YATs meetings was followed 
by Member States and whether 
the national reform programmes 
included reference to the expected 
results of the ESF reprogramming 
and reallocation exercise following 
the YATs meetings.

 
23

33  Directorate‑General for 

Employment, Social Affairs 
and Inclusion YAT mission 
report for meeting on 
22 February 2012 in Italy.

34  Secretariat‑General’s 

operational conclusions sent 
to the Permanent 
Representative of Spain to the 
EU on 14 May 2012.

Observations

Youth action teams meetings 
provided proposals for 
ESF reprogramming and 
reallocation in general terms

46 
Following the YATs meetings in Febru‑
ary 2012, the Commission summarised 
the proposals made for ESF repro‑
gramming and budget reallocation in 
conclusion notes (called operational 
conclusions) prepared by the Secretar‑
iat‑General and formally transmitted 
them to the Member States.

47 
Our analysis of Directorate‑General for 
Employment, Social Affairs and Inclu‑
sion reports about the YATs meetings 
and the Secretariat‑General’s opera‑
tional conclusions showed that for 
seven of the eight Member States, the 
participants discussed in general terms 

possible options for the redistribu‑
tion of ESF funds. They did not actu‑
ally specify how existing instruments/
programmes could be used more 
effectively to address youth unem‑
ployment. Examples of the outcome of 
these discussions as recorded by the 
Commission were: ‘further prioritisa‑
tion in reprogramming to give more 
emphasis to youth employment and 
support to SMEs can be explored‘ 
(Italy)33 or ‘the authorities will explore 
the idea of financing additional Leon‑
ardo/Erasmus traineeships under the 
ESF OP‘ and ‘will explore possible pilot 
projects for dual vocational training‘ 
(Spain)34.

48 
The YAT meeting with the Lithuanian 
authorities can be considered as 
a good practice case compared to the 
general approach followed (see Box 4).

4
x
o
B

Specific proposals in the operational conclusions of the YAT meeting in Lithuania

The operational conclusions of the YAT meeting in Lithuania identified concrete actions to improve the situ‑
ation of young people unemployed by refocusing in a short time ESF available funds. These actions included 
amongst others:

 ο the prolongation of the project ’Be active on the labour market’ which had ended in January 2012 to cover 
an additional 6 000‑10 000 young people during 2012‑2013 (additional ESF funding need estimated at 
6‑10 million euro). The effectiveness of this project had been positively assessed, more than half of the 
participants being employed on a permanent basis;

 ο the acceleration of the implementation of the Entrepreneurship Promotion Fund by providing an addi‑

tional 400 loans and to train an additional 1 000 young people (additional ESF funding need estimated at 
3 million euro). Almost half of the participants were people under 29 years old.

 
24

35  Secretariat‑General’s 

operational conclusions sent 
to the Permanent 
Representative of Greece to 
the EU on 14 May 2012.

Observations

49 
The Secretariat‑General’s operational 
conclusions emphasised the need to 
expand or extend existing measures, 
but they did not clarify sufficiently 
how the effectiveness of existing 
measures could be improved. For 
example, the operational conclusions 
for Greece mentioned the following 
measures: ‘increasing the effective 
implementation of the new national 
lifelong learning strategy, strengthen‑
ing Vocational Education and Train‑
ing (VET) and apprenticeships sys‑
tems…’35, but they did not specify how 
these measures could be improved 
compared to the past, in order to help 
young  people overcome the spe‑
cific barriers they face in entering the 
 labour market.

50 
Some existing measures were pro‑
posed to be extended because they 
had ensured quick implementation in 
terms of absorption of funds without 
their past effectiveness in terms of 
results (e.g. number of final recipients 
entering jobs after the ESF interven‑
tion) having been discussed or as‑
sessed. Finally, our analysis showed 
that the Commission did not provide 
any technical guidelines for Member 
States on how to improve the target‑
ing of funds in the implementation of 
their OPs (e.g. by defining the scope of 
the activities better, launching spe‑
cific calls for tender including specific 
selection criteria addressing the needs 
of the priority target groups of young 
people, etc.) during these meetings.

Youth action teams led to 
reprogramming and/or 
reallocation of ESF funds but 
providing an overall figure is 
difficult

51 
For our assessment of the outcome of 
the YATs in terms of redirection of ESF 
funding to measures aiming at reduc‑
ing levels of youth unemployment, we 
considered two specific aspects: the 
formal ESF reprogramming (with ap‑
proval through a Commission decision) 
and the budget reallocation process 
within a priority axis of an existing OP. 
In order to provide an estimate of the 
total amount of ESF reprogramming/
reallocation following the YATs initia‑
tive, we reviewed financial informa‑
tion provided by the Commission in 
2015 for all 60 ESF OPs concerned. We 
assessed in detail the extent of the 
reprogramming for a sample of eight 
ESF OPs.

52 
Our analysis showed that there was 
an ESF reprogramming exercise after 
the YATs meetings in February 2012. 
A total of 36 ESF OPs out of 60 in the 
eight Member States were repro‑
grammed between February 2012 
and March 2013. For the eight OPs 
that we examined in detail, the ESF 
funds reprogrammed with the objec‑
tive of delivering fast results to tackle 
youth unemployment, as confirmed 
by the Commission, amounted to 
337 million euro.

Observations

25

54 
Moreover, we found that this infor‑
mation is not accurate, at least for 
Italy, where the reported total re‑
allocated amount of 557 million euro 
includes, for the regional ESF OP in 
Italy (Puglia), an amount of 27 mil‑
lion euro which has in fact been 
reprogrammed and reported as such 
in the total reprogrammed amount (i.e. 
131 million euro).

53 
Providing an exact overall figure 
on the ESF reprogramming and/or 
reallocation in relation to the YATs is 
difficult since it may not have been 
a consequence of the related meet‑
ings, but due to other reasons. Accord‑
ing to the information made available 
by Member States to the Commission, 
by June 2013, the YATs initiative has 
resulted in the reprogramming and/
or reallocation of around 1 915 mil‑
lion euro of ESF funds in the concerned 
Member States with the exception of 
Latvia (see Table 2). This corresponds 
to 19.2 % of the 9 971 million euro ini ‑
tially available unallocated ESF funds 
for the eight Member States.

2 ESF amounts reprogrammed and reallocated as a result of the YATs until June 2013, 
e
l
b
a
T

as reported by the Commission

ESF before YATs (end 2011)

ESF amounts mobilised for youth employment measures/actions  
as a result of the YATs

Member 
State

Number of 
ESF OPs

Total ESF1 
(million euro)

ESF unallocated 
according to the 
Commission 
(million euro)

ESF amounts repro-
grammed according 
to the Commission 
(million euro)

ESF amounts real-
located according 
to the Commission 
(million euro)

Total3 
(million euro)

Share over 
total ESF(3/1)

Ireland1

Greece

Spain

Italy2

Latvia

Lithuania

Portugal

Slovakia3

TOTAL

1

4

22

24

1

2

4

2

60

375

4 364

8 057

6 931

583

1 028

6 845

1 500

29 683

2

1 495

2 712

3 674

0

289

1 760

39

9 971

25

466

491

27

143

131

0

75

557

0

0

25

466

491

688

0

27

143

75

1 915

6.7 %

10.7 %

6.1 %

9.9 %

0.0 %

2.6 %

2.1 %

5.0 %

6.5 %

1  For Ireland, the reallocation of 25 million euro was already requested in December 2011, i.e. before the YATs initiative was launched.
2   For Italy, the reported reallocated amount includes 27 million euro of the OP Puglia which in fact have been reprogrammed and reported as 

such in the reprogrammed amount (see paragraph 54).

3   For Slovakia, the estimation of 39 million euro of unallocated funds as communicated by the Commission was underestimated; it appeared 

later that in fact 422 million euro were available (see Box 2).

Source: ECA calculation based on the System for Fund Management in the EU (SFC2007) and data provided by the Commission.

 
Observations

55 
The Commission was not in a posi‑
tion to provide a breakdown between 
the ESF amounts reprogrammed and 
those reallocated for five of the eight 
Member States. For the sampled OPs 
the Commission could provide infor‑
mation only for ESF OPs in two Mem‑
ber States: the Greek Education and 
Lifelong Learning OP (approx. 24 mil‑
lion euro related to new measures 
for youth) and the Human Resources 
Development OP for Lithuania (approx. 
29 million euro).

56 
In March 2014, the Commission issued 
its most recent publication focusing 
on ESF redirection36. According to this, 
ESF resources reprogrammed and/
or reallocated to specific actions for 
youth amounted to around 4.2 bil‑
lion euros37, of which 1.8 billion euro 
had been committed to projects which 
were ongoing at that time in the Mem‑
ber States. Around 1.2 million young 
people were likely to benefit from this 
support. The Court could not confirm 
the accuracy of these figures.

57 
In 2014 the EU’s youth (aged 15‑24) 
unemployment rate has decreased to 
just above 22 % (see paragraph 1). The 
evolution of the trend in the youth un‑
employment rate in the eight Member 
States concerned by the YAT initiative 
is shown below (see Figure 3) but a di‑
rect link has not been established with 
the YATs exercise.

26

36  European Commission 
Directorate‑General for 
Employment, Social Affairs 
and Inclusion, ‘Youth 
employment initiative and the 
European Social Fund, 
European Social Fund 
thematic paper’, March 2014.

37  The ESF resources reported by 
the Commission include for 
Italy a reallocation of national 
funds to measures combating 
youth unemployment which 
was made possible via the 
reduction of the national 
co‑funding rate for ESF and 
ERDF OPs. The financial 
resources then released of 
more than 1.5 billion euro 
were invested within 
a nationally funded cohesion 
action plan, in a series of 
initiatives, including several 
benefiting young and 
unemployed people.

3
e
r
u
g
i
F

Unemployment rates for young aged 15 to 24 in YATs Member States, 2008‑2014

60 %

50 %

40 %

30 %

20 %

10 %

Ireland
Greece
Spain
Italy
Latvia
Lithuania
Portugal
Slovakia

2008

2009

2010

2011

2012

2013

2014

Source: Eurostat; Total unemployment ‑ Labour Force Survey series ‑ Unemployment rates by sex, age and nationality (%).

 
27

38  Article 48 of Council 

Regulation (EC) No 1083/2006.

39  COM MEMO 12/100, 
14 February 2012.

Observations

The Commission’s 
assessment of the ESF OP 
amendments proposed by 
the Member States focused 
mainly on budgetary aspects

58 
When proposing to amend an OP, the 
Member States are required to provide 
analyses of the reasons for the revi‑
sions, including the expected impact 
of those revisions38. In order to ensure 
the economic, efficient and effective 
use of EU funds, Member States should 
also explain the intended effects of the 
changes, in terms of their effectiveness 
and efficiency in achieving results in 
relation to the OP and EU objectives.

59 
In its communication on the YATs 
initiative the Commission stated that 
’the reprogramming must be done 
in agreement between the European 
Commission and each of the eight 
Member States and this will be the 
core work of the action teams’39. In this 
context, the Commission’s ESF‑related 
work consisted in particular of verify‑
ing how the support for fighting youth 
unemployment on the ground in these 
Member States could be accelerated 
and/or redirected towards interven‑
tions which work/could work faster 
than others and have the necessary 
impact.

60 
Our analysis of the available docu‑
mentation for the eight ESF OPs 
sampled indicates however that the 
Commission had focused its assess‑
ment primarily on budgetary aspects 
(e.g. avoiding the potential risk of the 
automatic de‑commitment of alloca‑
tions, accelerating the low financial im‑
plementation of OP, etc.), rather than 
on the effectiveness of the proposed 
changes, i.e. the best use of ESF funds 
to help young people to find a job or 
increase their employability. The Com‑
mission, through its assessment and 
comments to Member States, did not 
ensure that the submitted OP amend‑
ments were justified with reference 
to the achievement of better results. 
Nor did it ensure that the proposed 
reprogramming was an appropriate 
response to address the specific needs 
of the different groups of young peo‑
ple (see Box 5).

61 
While not mandatory under the 2007‑
2013 ESF framework, the Commission 
did not generally encourage Mem‑
ber States to set out or adjust result 
indicators which would allow a better 
assessment of the effectiveness of the 
reallocated funding for young people. 
The audit found that, with the excep‑
tion of Portugal (Human Potential OP, 
see Box 6) and Spain (Navarra OP), the 
other audited OPs did not set relevant 
result indicators.

Observations

28

5
x
o
B

6
x
o
B

Example of an OP‑proposed amendment not assessed by the Commission from 
a performance perspective

In the case of Spain (Navarra OP), the region justified the reprogramming with two objectives of accelerat‑
ing the low implementation of the OP (which, in December 2011, risked not being able to absorb all allocated 
funds) and mitigating the impact of the economic crisis on young people, people over 45 years old, people 
with disabilities and the long‑term unemployed. In the framework of this OP, one of the aims was to reinforce 
the 'Programmes for initial professional qualification' (PCPI), which offer a path for young people that have not 
obtained a certificate of basic education.

Although the Commission’s assessment states that one of the objectives of the revision was to ‘meet existing 
demand for training, skilling and reskilling action’, the region’s explanation for the changes in the OP does 
not actually contain any information on what skilling or reskilling is required. There was no evidence that the 
Commission tried to ascertain whether the changes to training systems proposed by the regional authorities 
of Navarra moved in the direction of providing skills that were in line with the demands of the labour market.

The objective of increasing absorption of available funding was also one of the main objectives in the revision 
of the proposed OP amendments for Ireland, Italy (Sicily) and Portugal.

Example of good practice of specifying new results indicator

Following the YAT meeting, Portugal launched the 'Youth impulse' programme, which provides a set of meas‑
ures aimed at unemployed young people, providing them with work experience to assist their integration in 
the labour market.

Under the ESF Human Potential OP, a new series of professional internships called ‘Employment passport’, 
were introduced as part of the 'Youth impulse' programme. Through the amendment of this OP, the target 
values of two result indicators (‘number of jobs created’ and ‘number of trainees integrated after ending an 
internship’) were increased to reflect the increased financial allocation. In addition it also introduced a new 
indicator: ‘number of jobs created by reimbursing social security contributions’ to measure the performance 
of the support for hiring young people, via the repayment of contributions to social security conditional on 
net job creation.

 
 
Observations

29

Youth action plans prepared 
with different levels of detail 
and limited reference to 
youth action teams in the 
national reform programmes

62 
Based on information provided by the 
Commission, while not a mandatory 
requirement, following the YATs meet‑
ings youth action/employment plans 
have been prepared by five out of the 
eight Member States: Greece, Italy 
(Sicily)40, Lithuania, Portugal and Slo‑
vakia41. According to the Commission 
their main objective is to set out spe‑
cific policy and budgetary measures to 
support job creation and training for 
young people, tackling skills mismatch 
and early school leaving.

63 
Four of these action plans (for Greece, 
Lithuania, Portugal and Slovakia42) pre‑
sented measures to be supported by 
the ESF with different levels of detail 
on how funding would be refocused 
on targeted measures/actions tackling 
youth unemployment. The 2012 action 
plan for Italy (Sicily) was funded by 
national resources freed by increas‑
ing the EU co‑financing rate for this 
regional ESF OP and involved no ESF 
funding.

64 
Our audit revealed that not all the 
measures set out in the youth action 
plans indicated a strong targeting of 
the identified priority group. For in‑
stance, despite the fact that, according 
to the Commission’s documents, the 
YAT meeting in Portugal stated that 
highly qualified young people were 
a priority in order to tackle the ‘brain 
drain’, the presented measures to be 
supported by ESF were not specifi‑
cally aimed at young people with high 
qualifications43 (see Box 7).

40  The Italy (Sicily) youth 
employment plan was 
proposed on 19 December 
2011 (i.e. before the YATs 
initiative) in the context of the 
Italian cohesion plan. The 
youth employment plan 
consists of 452 million euro in 
national resources made 
available as a result of the 
increase in the ESF 
co‑financing from the EU 
budget for the Sicily ESF OP in 
order to avoid 
de‑commitment.

41  Regarding Slovakia, the youth 
action plan was not directly 
a result of the YAT exercise. Its 
drafting had started earlier in 
the context of the national 
reform programme and 
implementation of the 
amended VET law.

42 

In the case of Slovakia the 
target group included 
unemployed young people 
under the age of 29, but also 
disadvantaged people over 50 
years. The exact amount 
allocated to support young 
people and the number of 
jobs to be created per target 
group were not specified.

43  Level seven and level eight of 
the Quadro Nacional de 
Qualificacões.

7
x
o
B

Example of weak targeting of the identified priority groups

The minutes of the YAT meeting state that ’in order to tackle the ’brain drain’ and putting the expertise of the 
highly qualified at the service of the Portuguese labour market and businesses, the strategic plan pays special 
attention to those with master’s and PhD degrees’. However, in the Portuguese youth action plan, provided by 
the Commission, the single measure specifically targeted to the higher education category represented only 
11 % of the ESF resources devoted to the plan.

 
Observations

30

67 
Also, in the Commission’s assess‑
ment of the NRPs, the reference to 
the YATs was mainly linked to general 
statements on amounts being repro‑
grammed to measures supporting 
young people rather than concrete 
solutions for the specific situation and 
needs of young unemployed people 
and their expected impact.

65 
Elements of these youth action plans 
could be included by Member States 
in their national reform programmes 
(NRPs). These NRPs are assessed by the 
Commission in the context of the Euro‑
pean Semester exercise. Therefore we 
also reviewed the 2012 and 2013 NRPs 
for the eight Member States, and the 
related Commission assessment, to as‑
certain whether they made reference 
to the outcomes of the YATs meetings.

66 
We found that the outcome of the 
YATs meetings and its implication for 
redirecting ESF funding towards youth 
employment measures were referred 
to only in a general way in the NRPs 
(see Box 8).

8
x
o
B

Examples of ESF‑supported youth employment measures referred to in NRPs

The Italian NRP for 2012 indicated that ‘reprogramming will be extended to new measures for youth training 
and employability, within the framework of the EU‑Italy action group on youth unemployment and entre‑
preneurship established after the European Council of 30 January 2012’. However, no details of measures 
affected by the reprogramming were provided.

The Irish NRP for 2012 included a section on youth unemployment. This section mentioned the visit of a Com‑
mission delegation in February to discuss the key challenges of youth unemployment. However, it did not in‑
clude any description of the outcome of that visit in terms of measures that would be supported by EU funds. 
The text stated that the Irish government remained ’committed to developing innovative policy solutions to 
tackle this key challenge’.

 
31

44 

In the context of which the 
YATs exercise took place.

45 

In 2012 no annual examination 
meeting was held for Ireland.

Observations

The Commission’s 
monitoring and reporting 
on the results of the 
youth action teams 
initiative

68 
As regards the follow‑up given by the 
Commission to the YATs initiative, we 
examined whether:

 ο

 ο

specific monitoring arrangements 
were established for the YATs 
reprogrammed and reallocated 
amounts;

the Commission’s reporting 
contained relevant and reliable 
information on the actual achieve‑
ments of the YATs initiative.

The Commission’s follow‑up 
of the results of the youth 
action teams initiative 
was on the basis of the 
existing ESF monitoring 
arrangements

69 
The Commission has monitored 
together with the Member States 
the YATs‑related OP modifications in 
favour of youth on the basis of the 
existing ESF regulatory framework, in 
particular through the annual imple‑
mentation reports and the annual 
examination of the OPs.

70 
The annual implementation reports 
reviewed by the Court revealed that 
little information was available on 
the reprogramming exercise and the 
related results achieved. They usually 
include only examples and not consist‑
ent and comparable information on 
specific youth target groups. We found 
that Spain (Navarra OP) was the only 
case where the Commission explicitly 
requested the Member State to in‑
clude monitoring indicators related to 
the ‘Youth opportunities initiative’44 in 
its observations to the 2012 implemen‑
tation report.

71 
We also assessed the minutes of the 
annual examination meetings pro‑
vided by the Commission and found 
that, in four out of the seven45 cases 
examined, their comments focused 
on financial implementation and 
outputs rather than on actual results. 
In these minutes, we found reference 
to achievements in the context of the 
YATs initiative for Italy, Lithuania and 
Slovakia.

72 
Based on our analysis, the Commis‑
sion accepted the data presented by 
Member States in the annual examina‑
tion meetings without carrying out 
sufficient verification (see Box 9).

Observations

32

9
x
o
B

Example of issues arising from data reported by the Member States on what was 
achieved

The Commission’s minutes for the annual examination meeting held with the Lithuanian authorities in Janu‑
ary 2014 stated that the targets for three measures had already been achieved46. For one of them, the measure 
concerning the provision of micro‑credits, our recalculation revealed that in fact only 72 % of the target value 
had been achieved.

46  Vocational education and training for youth, support of the acquisition of professional skills and the provision of micro‑credits.

74 
Based on this information, the Com‑
mission reported on the results of 
the YATs initiative in response to the 
various updates requested by the 
European Council (May 2012, Novem‑
ber 2012, March 2013, June 2013 and 
October 2013) and on its own initiative 
(in March 2014).

Shortcomings in the 
Commission’s reporting on 
results of the youth action 
teams initiative

73 
In order to keep the European Council 
informed on the progress with the 
YATs reprogramming exercise, the 
Commission made informal requests 
on an ad hoc basis for information 
to the ESF managing authorities, to 
obtain updates regarding the situation 
in the Member State and in particular 
on ESF reprogrammed/reallocated 
funds and on the estimated number of 
people likely to benefit. The Commis‑
sion limited its information request to 
output indicators (e.g. participation in 
ESF measures), rather than results (see 
paragraph 26).

 
Observations

33

75 
Our review of the Commission’s update 
reports to the European Council and 
other communications showed that 
these reports did not provide a quali‑
tative analysis of the implementation 
of the reprogrammed and reallocated 
funds (see Box 10).

76 
Examples presented as ‘concrete ac‑
tions’ and ‘country‑specific results on 
how the action teams have helped 
young people’ were sometimes not 
exhaustive (see Box 11).

0
1
x
o
B

1
1
x
o
B

Examples of limited analysis provided by the Commission within its updates to the 
European Council

The YATs updates were limited in their description of the results of the action teams. For example, the 
May 2012 update included, for Greece: ‘following the work of the YAT in spring 2012, new targeted actions are 
being initiated for youth’ without specifying which new youth measures would be supported by the ESF and 
what were the financial amounts at stake.

In addition, for Spain, it stated that ‘135 million euro was directed to the public employment service to help 
young people find work’. These additional funds were provided to support measures already in place at 
national level especially in order to help employ more young people, without providing any explanation as to 
their past effectiveness.

Example of overoptimistic reporting on concrete actions

In the case of the regional ESF OP for Italy (Sicily), new actions in favour of youth employment were not 
financed by the transfer of ESF resources but by the release, through an increased EU co‑financing rate, of 
national resources originally allocated to the operational programme. This was done under the condition 
that national funds would have been entirely devoted to youth. This resulted in a plan worth 452 million euro 
which was expected to benefit 50 000 young people. This was announced and reported by the Commission as 
ongoing in several updates to the Council between May 2012 and June 2013.

However, in June 2013, the monitoring committee informed the Commission that the plan showed a signifi‑
cant delay in its start‑up phase. The project was finally launched in June 2014 but, immediately afterwards, 
in August 2014, the Sicilian region revoked the resolution approving and funding the project for the imple‑
mentation of the measures envisaged. This was due to significant deficiencies in the IT system for selection of 
participants, which had led to approximately 54 % of users being unable to access the selection process47.

47  Regione Sicilia, Decreto del Dirigente Generale Numero 4567 dated 18 August 2014.

 
 
Observations

34

77 
As all the information published 
stemmed from the Commission’s ad 
hoc requests to the Member States, 
the exercise had to be repeated each 
time a new update had to be provided 
to the Council and/or published. For 
such information provided by Mem‑
ber States on a voluntary basis, the 

Commission has no legal mandate to 
carry out reliability and/or plausibil‑
ity checks. This raises a potential risk 
of unreliable or incorrect information 
being included in the update reports 
provided to the Council. However, also 
for data which were reported under 
the ESF framework, checks were not 
always effective (see Box 12).

2
1
x
o
B

Example of imprecise data communicated to stakeholders

According to the March 2014 YAT update, as regards the Portuguese ‘Impulso jovem’ initiative, the Commis‑
sion stated that: ‘In Portugal ... 143 million euro of ESF have been reallocated … and the whole amount com ‑
mitted until the end of 2013. 56 000 young people have been covered’. However, this appears to be a target 
value to be reached rather than the achievements so far. In fact, the OP’s financial execution data, and the 
data reported in the 2013 annual implementation report related to the Human Potential OP, refer to fewer 
than 10 000 young people which were covered.

 
Conclusions and 
recommendations

35

78 
We concluded that the effectiveness 
of the advisory support provided by 
the Commission to the Member States 
in relation to the YATs was limited by 
the level and quality of information 
available to it on how existing ESF or 
national measures for young unem‑
ployed people work on the ground 
(see paragraphs 25 to 37). Moreover, 
the Commission’s assessment of the 
OP amendments proposed by Member 
States focused mainly on budgetary 
aspects rather than on the best use of 
these ESF funds (see paragraphs 58 to 
61). Finally, there were shortcomings in 
how the Commission reported on the 
result of the YATs initiative until 2014 
(see paragraphs 73 to 77).

 ο

complete and up‑to‑date informa‑
tion on the available ESF funding 
that could be potentially repro‑
grammed or reallocated.

80 
As part of its preparatory action the 
Commission has prepared ‘country 
fiches’ for each of the eight Member 
States concerned. It has also coordi‑
nated the meetings of the YATs and 
prepared operational conclusions 
in terms of ESF reprogramming and 
re allocation. While these were both 
positive contributions of the Commis‑
sion, they were carried out subject to 
the limitations mentioned above.

81 
Our analysis also showed that the 
youth action teams set up in the eight 
Member States made limited specific 
proposals on how to achieve faster 
and more effective results for young 
unemployed people. A broader‑based, 
more sustained and longer‑term ini‑
tiative would be required to develop 
dedicated national youth action plans 
of the type envisaged by the Commis‑
sion and enable Member States to use 
Structural Funds effectively to support 
their efforts to reduce the levels of 
youth unemployment.

The Commission provided 
advisory support to Member 
States but was limited by the 
level and quality of information 
available

79 
The YATs initiative could not meet 
the high expectations raised at the 
informal meeting of the 2012 European 
Council, not least due to the limita‑
tions in information available to the 
Commission on the basis of the moni‑
toring and reporting arrangements set 
out in the regulations for the 2007‑
2013 programme period. This meant 
that the Commission did not have:

 ο

an overview of the existing 
ESF‑funded youth employment 
measures and which ones were 
successful in terms of their tar‑
geted and actual results at Mem‑
ber State level. Such information 
could have helped make practical 
and short‑term proposals on how 
to redirect ESF funds to measures 
which had proved effective in the 
past or elsewhere;

Conclusions and recommendations

36

Recommendation 1

For future initiatives of this kind, the 
Commission should take due account 
of the possibilities and constraints 
 given by the political and legal con‑
text, its specific knowledge and exper‑
tise of the area (based on the imple‑
mentation of EU and nationally funded 
measures) and the availability of the 
financial resources at EU and Member 
State level.

While the youth action 
teams initiative led to 
ESF reprogramming and 
reallocation, the assessment 
of the Commission on OP 
amendments focused mainly 
on budgetary aspects

82 
According to information provided by 
the Member States to the Commission, 
the total amount of reprogrammed 
and reallocated ESF funds in seven of 
the eight Member States which car‑
ried out the exercise totalled 1.9 bil‑
lion euro by June 2013. Providing an 
exact overall figure is however difficult 
since not all of this ESF reprogram‑
ming is necessarily a consequence of 
the YATs initiative, but could be due to 
other reasons.

83 
Following the YATs meetings and in 
relation to their operational conclu‑
sions, all Member States prepared 
youth action plans or considered these 
aspects in their national reform pro‑
grammes, although they were general 
in nature in both cases. Any repro‑
gramming of ESF funding required in 
this context can only be introduced by 
the Member State concerned through 
a proposal to amend the relevant OPs. 
The Commission is required then to 
assess the justification provided by the 
Member State and approve the change 
if satisfied.

84 
We found that, when assessing the 
Member States’ requests for amend‑
ments to the sampled OPs, the Com‑
mission did not examine whether the 
reprogrammed ESF funds were more 
likely to help young people to ’find 
a job or increase their employability’ 
than the measures initially planned. 
Instead, its assessment focused mainly 
on the budgetary aspects of the 
reprogramming exercise. On the basis 
of the information that the Member 
States provided to the Commission we 
concluded that it is also not possible 
to assess to what extent the specific 
needs of the different groups of young 
unemployed people were targeted by 
the reprogrammed and/or reallocated 
ESF funds in 2012.

Conclusions and recommendations

37

Recommendation 2

For the 2014‑2020 programme period, 
the Commission should:

(a)  ensure that future reprogramming 

requests from Member States are 
triggered by an expectation of 
achieving better results rather 
than mainly resolving difficulties in 
absorbing EU funds;

(b)  approve the Member States’ 
requests for OP amendments 
only if the additional results to be 
obtained through the proposed 
budgetary transfers can reason‑
ably be achieved;

(c)  require Member States to report 
in sufficient detail both extraordi‑
nary transfers within operational 
programmes and changes within 
priorities in their annual imple‑
mentation reports and present the 
results achieved;

(d)  participate actively in OP monitor‑
ing committees and encourage 
Member States to take the ap‑
propriate steps where it is clear 
from its assessment of the annual 
implementation reports that the 
targets will not be met.

Shortcomings in the 
Commission’s reporting to the 
Council on the impact of the 
youth action teams initiative

85 
As the Commission was aware of the 
limitations of the information provided 
systematically by the Member States 
under the ESF monitoring arrange‑
ments, for the purpose of preparing 
regular updates to the Council on the 
progress of the initiative, it had made 
ad hoc requests for information to 
be provided by Member States. For 
such information provided by Mem‑
ber States on a voluntary basis, the 
Commission has no legal mandate to 
carry out reliability and/or plausibil‑
ity checks. However, also for data 
which was reported under the ESF 
framework, checks were not always 
effective.

86 
As a result, the analysis of the informa‑
tion provided to the Council showed 
some shortcomings in terms of com‑
pleteness, consistency and reliability. 
Furthermore as there are no systematic 
checks carried out by the Commis‑
sion on the information that has been 
provided by the Member States there 
is a potential risk of unreliable or incor‑
rect statements being included in the 
update reports provided.

Conclusions and recommendations

38

Recommendation 3

When using data provided by Member 
States in its communications the Com‑
mission should ensure that minimum 
plausibility and reliability checks are 
systematically carried out.

This Report was adopted by Chamber II, headed by Mr Henri GRETHEN, Member 
of the Court of Auditors, in Luxembourg at its meeting of 11 November 2015.

For the Court of Auditors

Vítor Manuel da SILVA CALDEIRA
President

 
 
 
Reply of the  
Commission

Executive summary

I
Common Commission reply to paragraphs I, II, III 
and IV:

Youth unemployment has been a widespread prob‑
lem in many Member States during the last decade. 
The YAT, although an ad hoc instrument, has had 
the merit to put this problem, exacerbated by the 
economic crisis, high on the European political 
agenda.

This new awareness has led to a number of con‑
crete actions both at EU and Member State level 
including in particular the ‘Youth guarantee’ and 
the ‘Youth employment initiative‘ (YEI). The ‘Youth 
employment package’ (2012), a follow‑up to the 
wider employment package, included a proposal 
to establish a youth guarantee. This resulted in 
a re commendation adopted by the Council in April 
2013.

This has also led European leaders to take concrete 
steps on the financial side: namely by launching 
the YEI (2013). It aims to support in particular young 
people not in education, employment or training 
in regions with a youth unemployment rate above 
25 %. The YEI, together with the ESF, has provided 
the Member States with targeted funding to start 
putting the ‘Youth guarantee’ into practice.

IV
The Commission notes that the amounts of ‘avail‑
able’ ESF funds estimated by the Member States 
had been indicative, depending in particular on 
already launched calls for proposals and contract‑
ing arrangements under the relevant operational 
programmes.

39

V
In the Commission's view, the YATs initiative has met 
the political expectations set out by the European 
Council in its conclusions of 30 January 2012. The 
key objective of the joint YATs — an ad hoc, punc‑
tual initiative — was to mobilise EU and national 
instruments, including Structural Funds, and to 
discuss policy reforms to be included in youth job 
plans. The teams were meant to ‘shake the tree’ by 
raising awareness at the highest political level, cre‑
ating a sense of urgency and giving a stronger steer 
while not creating additional administrative or/and 
legal procedures. 

Also, the Commission considers that the YATs made 
an important contribution by paving the way for 
new initiatives to combat youth unemployment, 
including the ‘Youth guarantee’, the YEI and the 
improved 2014‑2020 programming of the ESF, with 
an increased focus on young people. 

The Commission proactively used all the instru‑
ments available to it, given the legal framework in 
place, to achieve the objectives of the YATs initiative 
and to report on them. 

While for funds implemented under shared man‑
agement the Commission may not always have 
detailed information on all supported measures 
and one of the objectives of the YATs meetings was 
precisely to double‑check with Member States the 
estimates of available ESF funding, making sure 
that the best and most up‑to‑date information was 
used, the Commission provides advice and guid‑
ance including on the basis of information obtained 
and policy assessment carried out in the context of 
the European Semester.

As regards the appropriateness of the measures 
funded, the typical measures for youth employment 
supported by the ESF being training, work experi‑
ence, hiring subsidies, further learning and educa‑
tion, the approach had been to steer Member States 
to boost the well‑performing ones among these 
measures. 

Reply of the Commission 

40

In its regular reporting to the European Council, the 
Commission, based on the information provided 
by Member States, reported a number of positive 
developments following the YATs' mobilisation 
in terms of launched measures on the ground, 
national budget support and number of young 
persons supported. The Commission considers that 
funds that were reprogrammed to increase the 
financial support to well‑functioning youth pro‑
grammes represented a clear improvement in the 
EU’s support to young people. 

Concerning monitoring, the Commission notes that 
under shared management, Member States are 
responsible for setting up monitoring and reporting 
systems and for ensuring their reliability, subject 
to Commission audits. The Commission had at its 
disposal information from the reporting required 
by the ESF regulation. In addition, as the YATs were 
a political exercise and announced as such from 
the outset, the Commission also collected data 
informally, through questionnaires and requests 
for information, as well as through other policy 
processes, notably the European Semester. For such 
information, the Commission has no legal mandate 
to carry out reliability and/or plausibility checks.

VI First indent
The Commission accepts this recommendation.

In its actions, the Commission always takes into 
consideration the political, legal, financial and 
administrative context. In the particular case of the 
YATs initiative, the Commission was aware that it 
would face several constraints. However, this was 
not a reason for inaction: given the unacceptable 
unemployment situation of young people, the Com‑
mission was determined to take whatever action 
was possible to improve the situation. 

As a rule, the Commission systematically bases 
exercises such as this on the expertise gathered 
with the implementation of the European Structural 
and Investment Funds (ESIF), and in particular the 
European Social Fund, and also its participation in 
the European Semester. 

VI Second indent (a)
The Commission accepts this recommendation and 
considers that the current legal framework contains 
the necessary requirements. 

The 2014‑2020 ESIF legal framework already goes 
a long way in providing the conditions for ensur‑
ing better value for money. This is to be achieved, 
inter alia, via a performance framework and reserve, 
ex ante conditionalities and common output and 
result indicators. The use and programming of 
the ESIF are furthermore tightly linked to the EU’s 
strategy for growth and jobs and country‑specific 
recommendations.

Article 30 of the CPR requires that OP amendments 
be accompanied by a justification from the Mem‑
ber State concerning the expected impact on the 
achievement of national Europe 2020 targets as well 
as the OP specific objectives. 

In addition, Article 23 of the CPR allows the Com‑
mission, on its initiative, to request that a Member 
State propose amendments to its operational 
programmes with a view to ensuring compliance 
with Council recommendations in the context of 
the European Semester and thus to ensure that the 
ESIF support the relevant growth and jobs priorities 
at national or regional level.

The Commission notes that the supervision of any 
budgetary/absorption issues is also part of the 
Commission's supervision role.

VI Second indent (b)
The Commission accepts this recommendation and 
also considers that the current legal framework 
contains the necessary requirements. 

Article 30 of the CPR explicitly requires that upon 
assessment by the Commission of the Member 
State justification and upon a request for further 
information, the Member State shall provide to the 
Commission all necessary additional information. 
In addition, specific additional rules apply to OP 
amendments related to allocation of the perfor‑
mance reserve.

Reply of the Commission 

41

VI Second indent (c)
The Commission accepts this recommendation and 
also considers that the current legal framework 
contains the necessary requirements. 

The CPR envisages reporting as part of Article 50 
annual implementation reports on all relevant 
performance aspects. The Member States are also 
required to report on the basis of the categories of 
intervention as set out in the relevant Commission 
Implementing Regulation (EU) No 215/2014.

VI Second indent (d)
The Commission accepts this recommendation and 
is of the view that this is already current practice, 
given also the specific remit of its participation in 
the monitoring committee.

VI Third indent
The Commission accepts this recommendation. 
Indeed, in the context of shared management, 
the Commission checks, among other things, the 
robustness of the systems for recording and stor‑
ing the accounting records and the data on imple‑
mentation provided by the Member States. This is 
done typically through system audit work carried 
out by both the Commission and the national audit 
authorities. 

In the 2014‑2020 period, the CPR provides for the 
ESF/YEI managing authority to collect, store and 
record reliable data on indicators in a computer‑
ised system (Article 125(2)(a), (d) and (e)), subject to 
audits by the Commission.

Introduction

09
The Commission proposed to set up action teams 
in the Member States where youth unemployment 
was significantly above the EU average — this pro‑
posal was endorsed by the European Council. At the 
time, the EU average was 22.3 % so a reference rate 
of 30 % was chosen and eight Member States quali‑
fied for this action — this rate was consistent with 
the European Council statement. The Commission 
considers that it acted in line with the European 
Council’s statement. 

Observations

Common Commission reply to 
paragraphs 25 and 26
The Commission is only entitled to monitor EU fund‑
ing according to the provisions set out in the regu‑
lations and the Member States have considerable 
discretion as regards the reporting of performance 
information. While there was indeed a common 
(compulsory) output indicator for youth, Member 
States also reported on the results achieved yearly 
in the annual implementation report based on the 
specific indicators defined in the OP for each prior‑
ity axis, while these specific indicators did not allow 
for aggregation at EU level. In all cases, the Commis‑
sion has complied with these provisions.

27
The Commission considers that a sufficient number 
of indicators exist, albeit specific to each OP, allow‑
ing for a proper monitoring by the Commission.

Reply of the Commission 

42

The issue identified in the expert evaluation network 
study stems primarily from the fact that unlike report‑
ing on output indicators, reporting on result indicators 
for specific measures was not mandatory. Therefore 
comprehensive and consistent data on result indicators 
are not available. The introduction of common output 
and result indicators for the 2014‑2020 programming 
period will remedy this issue. 

28
The IAS report referred to by the Court concludes 
that certain existing weaknesses stem from the 
legal framework on which the Commission bases 
its work by definition. The IAS report also recog‑
nises the significant improvement in performance 
requirements introduced with the 2014‑2020 legal 
framework. In 2007‑2013 managing authorities 
were required to define specific result indicators 
and to set targets in the operational programmes. 
This was subject to negotiations when program‑
ming the operational programmes. The Commis‑
sion acknowledges that aggregation at EU level has 
thus been a challenge, but considers its monitor‑
ing at operational programme level as appropri‑
ate.  Furthermore, the Commission has carried out 
a study to analyse all specific result indicators and 
used the knowledge gained to propose common 
result indicators for 2014‑2020 and has set up an 
evaluation network to try to bring together moni‑
toring and evaluation evidence from managing 
authorities to provide information on performance 
for the desks and the reporting by the Commission. 

29
The Commission notes that, through their regular 
bilateral contacts with the managing authorities, 
their assessment of the annual implementation 
report and participation in the meetings foreseen 
by the regulation but also with policy departments 
in the Member States in the framework of the Euro‑
pean Semester cycle, the Commission desk offic‑
ers are informed of the advancement and ‘good 
practices’ of the OP implementation. Thanks to their 
analysis of various specific indicators, they are well 
aware of the effectiveness of the implementation of 
the different OPs. 

Moreover, the Commission launched several evalu‑
ations of policies for 2007‑2013 period which will 
be available by mid 2016. All these evaluations will 
provide useful evidence on the achievement of the 
programmes. In addition, specific volumes focusing 
on lessons learnt and good practices will be part of 
the final reports. 

Common Commission reply to 
paragraphs 30 to 32
The Commission's report was an overview on the 
basis of questionnaires to the managing author‑
ities — i.e. on the basis of the Member States' own 
assessment of what worked well as a good practice. 
The aim of the report was to disseminate policy 
ideas and practices in order to ‘inspire’ policy‑
makers. The report was not meant to provide an 
evaluation of the quality and effectiveness of ESF 
interventions

34
The Commission notes that one of the purposes of 
the YATs meetings was precisely to identify with 
the Member States more precisely what EU funding 
would be available and what more could be done to 
address the needs of the young unemployed. 

35
In the context of shared management, the relevant 
specific details regarding operations are available 
at Member State level since they are responsible for 
the launch and implementation of the various calls 
for applications. Despite the objective limitations 
of the 2007‑2013 legal framework, the Commission 
has proactively sought to collect on a more regular 
basis relevant information from the Member States 
on ESF support to youth employment measures in 
connection with other EU‑wide initiatives on youth 
employment. 

Reply of the Commission 

43

36
The Commission notes that its estimates were 
based on data voluntarily submitted by Member 
States. These estimates were only the starting 
points of the bilateral discussions and were system‑
atically updated on the basis of the real situation of 
the individual Member States. 

37
The Commission acknowledges that a technical 
error was made for Slovakia. However, the discus‑
sion at the YAT meeting took place on the basis of 
the correct figures. 

38
The Commission notes that in the context of pre‑
paring the YATs meetings, any assessment should 
be based on what the Commission announced, 
committed to and realistically could have delivered, 
within the agreed timeframe and the current legal 
framework. 

40
The Commission considers that the objective of 
the YATs was not to provide ex ante analyses to 
Member States pertaining to specific groups of 
young  people, nor examinations of future skills 
requirem ents. 

Moreover, the Commission’s analysis of labour 
market needs is not limited to the country fiches, 
which as briefing documents were used as back‑
ground notes to the YATs bilateral meetings. The 
geograph ical desk officers prepare detailed coun‑
try reports and analyse in‑depth the situation of 
employment and social policies in the Member 
States, which then feed into the formulation of the 
country‑ specific recommendations. Tackling youth 
unemployment involves a comprehensive approach 
and the country fiches present consistent data and 
policy not only on employment issues, but also on 
various other critical aspects, such as education. 

From the identification of the Member States with the 
highest youth unemployment rate to the subsequent 
analysis and discussions, the standard Eurostat defini‑
tion of young people was used (age 15‑24). However, 
the whole rationale of the YATs was to ensure the 
most appropriate country specific action, so in certain 
instances, some flexibility in the definition was applied 
where this was justified by national circumstances. 

41
The role of the YATs was to examine opportunities for 
swift action in order to respond to the immediate impact 
of the crisis. Skills mismatches are a structural problem 
and ESF OPs had already been programmed, back in 
2006, with a view to tackling structural issues of the 
labour markets. However, this track towards structural 
reform has been severely hampered by the economic 
crisis, with drastic increases in unemployment rates 
across the EU. Therefore, while the YATs had a mission to 
seek immediate solutions both financially and in terms of 
policy implementation, the overall parallel thrust of Com‑
mission efforts was to steer Member States back towards 
the path of reforms. 

In addition, a major part of collecting specific policy 
information is carried out by the Commission in the 
context of its analytical work on the European Semes‑
ter analysis, and published in the Commission/country 
reports. The Commission furthermore bases itself 
on a number of expert reports, and examples of DG 
Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion internal policy 
reports, notably the so‑called country reports, elab‑
orated in the context of the European Semester.

42
The Commission notes that the eight country fiches sug‑
gested policy guidelines based on an analysis of labour 
market needs, underpinned by a variety of sources, in 
particular based on the Commission analytical work in 
the context of the European Semester. 

Reply of the Commission 

44

43
See Commission reply to paragraph 41.

44
In Italy, the situation of the labour market was 
particularly difficult for young people. The country 
fiche did identify some groups of particular con‑
cern, including high and medium educated after 
graduation, but the initiatives followed a global 
approach to tackle the situation in a comprehensive 
way.

The choice of the transfer of management of the 
funds (as for all the other YATs initiatives) clearly had 
a two‑fold objective: raising human capital levels 
(to ease employment) and accelerating expenditure 
(given, as stated in the country fiche, that ‘problems 
in Italy do not relate to priorities in spending but to 
delays in implementation’).

45
The Commission notes that any assessment of the 
outcome of the YATs needs to take into account the 
objectives and purpose of the YATs missions and the 
ESF regulatory framework.

47
The core of the YATs missions was to, by way of 
high‑level political discussions, identify ways for 
national authorities to reallocate funding to pro‑
jects that would make the biggest difference in a 
short time. This entailed notably agreeing on how 
to deal with competing ESF priorities, but did not 
involve entering into the technicalities of fund 
management. The meetings represented the occa‑
sion to explore different possibilities, which had to 
be verified technically in light of the specificities of 
each OP.

Before any reprogramming could be done, it was 
necessary to discuss with the Member States the 
extent to which the ESF funds could be redirected 
towards youth programmes. 

For instance, in the case of countries with large 
number of OPs, such as Italy, any detailed proposal 
had to be checked for applicability with respect to 
the situation (implementation, results) of each OP 
(e.g. which OP to reprogramme, for how much, etc.). 

49
The Commission considers that the Secretariat‑ 
General’s summary operational conclusions should 
not be read in isolation. In the specific case of 
Greece, technical assistance was already very 
intense because of the financial assistance pro‑
gramme and the Secretariat‑General’s operational 
conclusions suggested the expansion/reinforce‑
ment of existing initiatives in the form of policy 
guidelines and set the grounds for further elabor‑
ation on specific measures responding to identified 
needs. The operational outcome of the YATs was the 
‘Action plan of targeted interventions to strengthen 
youth employment and entrepreneurship’, adopted 
by Greece in December 2012.

Furthermore, Member States already receive 
detailed country assessments and policy recom‑
mendations from the Commission in the context of 
the European Semester. 

50
The Commission refers to its reply to paragraphs 29, 
44 and 47.

Where relevant, specific changes to calls for tender 
and selection criteria were discussed in the con‑
text of monitoring committee meetings where the 
Commission plays an advisory role. The Commission 
considers that the added value of the proposed 
initiatives was not exclusively assessed in relation to 
their expected impact on absorption.

51
The Commission notes that the OP modifica‑
tions were not always entirely related to youth 
employment measures as such. They were often 
part of broader reallocations of funding towards 
employment measures in general. In addition, in 
the context of the YATs, the Commission’s ad visory 
role went beyond considerations of fina ncial 
reallocations. 

Reply of the Commission 

45

53
In order to provide a complete picture of the finan‑
cial outcomes of the YAT initiative, the Commission 
considers that it is also necessary to include the 
information on the financial resources devoted to 
youth‑linked initiatives resulting from the reduc‑
tion of national co‑financing in ESF and ERDF OPs. 
For instance, in the case of Italy, those resources, 
resulting from OP reprogramming, financed a series 
of initiatives (including the ‘Youth plan’ in  Sicily) 
encompassed in the national cohesion action 
plan. According to Italy, they account for about an 
additional 1.5 billion euro and have been part of the 
re allocated funding reported on Italy throughout 
the YATs exercise.

54
The Commission acknowledges the technical mis‑
take, which has however a very limited impact on 
the overall amount (below 4 % on the overall ESF 
amount, below 1.2 % when considering the overall 
YAT budget including the Italian cohesion action 
plan).

56
Under shared management Member States are 
responsible for setting up monitoring and reporting 
systems and for ensuring their reliability.

60
The Commission considers that increasing the 
financial support to youth programmes (training 
etc.) that were already delivering on the ground is 
better than having the money lost because of auto‑
matic de‑commitment. The programmes that were 
strengthened had already been assessed at the time 
of their adoption and their implementation was in 
line with the requirements of the regulations.

As regards the appropriateness of the measures 
funded, the typical measures for youth employment 
supported by the ESF being training, work experi‑
ence, hiring subsidies, further learning and educa‑
tion, the Commission’s approach had been to steer 
Member States to boost the well‑performing ones 
among these measures. In the overall youth unem‑
ployment context in 2011 (overall low employment 
and increasing inactivity rates, in particular for the 
NEETs), one of the key objective of the Commission 
was also to increase the coverage in terms of par‑
ticipants in measures that potentially could improve 
young persons' employability on the labour market. 
Last but not least, all of the above measures also 
remain crucial under the ‘Youth guarantee’, which 
the ESF also financially supports.

Common reply to para 64 and Box 7
The Commission stresses that the priority groups 
discussed at the bilateral meeting of the YAT were 
both highly qualified young people and young 
people with basic education. These two groups 
were also targeted by the Portuguese youth action 
plan, called ‘Impulso Jovem’ and the corresponding 
reprogramming of the OP.

Common reply to 65, 66, 67 and Box 8
The Commission notes that the NRPs are strategic 
documents under the sole responsibility of Member 
States. They do not aim at describing which meas‑
ures would be supported by EU Funds as a result of 
the YAT meeting. 

The Commission monitors the situation of young 
people on the labour market in the context of the 
European Semester, which aims at strengthening 
and promoting policy reforms for the benefit of 
EU citizens. In that context, the Commission pro‑
vides an in‑depth analytical assessment in country 
reports and proposes policy actions in the form of 
draft country‑specific recommendations. Under 
the 2015 European Semester, five Member States 
received the recommendations aiming at adopting 
more ambitious policy measures in this area.

Reply of the Commission 

46

68
The Commission notes that, in order to keep the 
administrative burden for Member States to an 
absolute minimum and deliver fast results, the YATs 
were implemented and monitored in accordance 
with the ESF legal provisions. 

70
The Commission notes that the information pro‑
vided in relation to indicators' targets depends on 
the overall context of the OP modification pro‑
posed and whether it is specifically linked to youth 
employment or more broadly, to boosting employ‑
ment measures for all target groups under the OP 
overall.

For instance, in the case of Greece, monitoring 
indicators for youth were already included in opera‑
tional programmes. 

71
The Commission notes that the annual review 
meeting minutes are not the only source of infor‑
mation in relation to OP regular monitoring by the 
Commission.

Common Commission reply to 
paragraph 72 and Box 9
The Commission does sometimes question the 
plausibility of specific indicators' values reported in 
the annual implementation report. Also, the Mem‑
ber States’ computerised systems are subject to 
systems audits by the Commission and the Member 
States’ audit authorities. 

The Commission acknowledges that there was one 
technical error in the information provided by the 
Lithuanian managing authority.

73
The Commission had at its disposal information 
from the reporting required by the ESF regulation. 
In addition, as the YATs was a political exercise and 
announced as such from the outset, the Commis‑
sion also collected data informally, through ques‑
tionnaires and requests for information, as well as 
through other policy processes, notably the Euro‑
pean Semester. 

No formal monitoring and reporting process that 
went beyond the ESF monitoring framework could 
be put in place for the YATs.

75
The reports to the European Council provided 
a general overview of the state of implementation 
of the YATs, on the basis of the data collected ad 
hoc from the Member States. See also the Commis‑
sion’s reply to paragraph 68. 

76
See Commission reply to paragraph 72.

Also, the reporting made by the Commission was 
based on information provided by Italy. Regarding 
the delays which have been significant in particu‑
lar in the start‑up phase of the national plan, the 
Commission urged quick implementation whenever 
possible.

77
Under shared management, Member States are 
responsible for setting up monitoring and report‑
ing systems and for ensuring their reliability. The 
Commission checks the robustness of the systems 
through its audits. 

Reply of the Commission 

47

Conclusions and recommendations

Common Commission reply to 
paragraphs 78 and 79
In the Commission's view, the YATs initiative has met 
the political expectations set out by the European 
Council in its conclusions of 30 January 2012. The 
key objective of the joint YATs was to mobilise EU 
and national instruments, including Structural 
Funds, and to discuss policy reforms to be included 
in youth job plans. The YATs focused on the chal‑
lenges identified in the targeted Member States. 
The teams were meant to ‘shake the tree’ by raising 
awareness at the highest political level, creating 
a sense of urgency and giving a stronger steer while 
not creating additional administrative or/and legal 
procedures. 

The Commission proactively used all the instru‑
ments available to it, given the legal framework in 
place, to achieve the objectives of the YATs initia‑
tive and to report on them. The experience of the 
YATs also contributed to the design of new policy 
initiatives, such as the youth employment package, 
and in that context, the ‘Youth guarantee’ Council 
recommendation. Furthermore, the close monitor‑
ing of the situation in the eight Member States con‑
cerned (as well as other Member States with high 
levels of youth unemployment) through the normal 
processes of the European Semester has entailed 
country‑specific recommendations (CSRs) related to 
youth employment. In its regular reporting to the 
European Council, the Commission, based on the 
information provided by Member States, reported 
a number of positive developments following the 
YATs' mobilisation in terms of launched measures on 
the ground, national budget support and number 
of young persons supported. 

79 First indent
While for funds implemented under shared man‑
agement the Commission may not always have 
detailed information on all supported measures, 
it provides advice and guidance including on the 
basis of information obtained and policy assess‑
ment carried out in the context of the European 
Semester.

79 Second indent
One of the objectives of the YATs meetings was 
precisely to double‑check with Member States the 
estimates of available ESF funding, making sure that 
the best and most up‑to‑date information was used.

80
The Commission considers that country fiches 
needed to be of a general nature, since they sum‑
marise the analysis that the Commission regularly 
carries out on labour market developments (e.g. 
the annual ‘Employment and social developments 
in Europe’ report, the annual ‘Labour Market and 
wage developments’ report and the ‘EU employ‑
ment and social situation quarterly review’). 

81
Given the urgency of the youth employment situ‑
ation, the Commission and the European Council 
decided to launch an ad hoc, punctual initiative 
which in particular resulted in a fast redirection of 
available ESF funds to youth‑related measures. 

Also, the Commission considers that the YATs made 
an important contribution by paving the way for 
new initiatives to combat youth unemployment, 
including the ‘Youth guarantee’, the YEI and the 
improved 2014‑2020 programming of the ESF, with 
an increased focus on young people. 

Recommendation 1
The Commission accepts this recommendation.

In its actions, the Commission always takes into 
consideration the political, legal, financial and 
administrative context. In the particular case of the 
YATs initiative, the Commission was aware that it 
would face several constraints. However, this was 
not a reason for inaction: given the unacceptable 
unemployment situation of young people, the Com‑
mission was determined to take whatever action 
possible to improve the situation. 

Reply of the Commission 

48

As a rule, the Commission systematically bases exer‑
cises such as this on the expertise gathered with 
the implementation of the European Structural and 
Investment Funds, and in particular the European 
Social Fund, and also its participation in the Euro‑
pean Semester. 

82
The Commission agrees that a stable overall figure 
is difficult to provide, given that the Commission 
can only access the formal OP modification deci‑
sions and that the amounts available within an OP 
or a Member State for redirection within or across 
OPs has evolved dynamically, depending on the 
level and speed of contracting of projects and the 
advancement of OP implementation overall.

84
The Commission considers that funds that were 
reprogrammed to increase the financial support to 
well‑functioning youth programmes represented 
a clear improvement in the EU support to young 
people. The actions strengthened in this way had in 
any case been selected, implemented and moni‑
tored in line with the rules and were thus consid‑
ered to deliver positive results, even where it was 
too early to undertake a fully fledged evaluation. 

As regards the appropriateness of the measures 
funded, the typical measures for youth employment 
supported by the ESF being training, work experi‑
ence, hiring subsidies, further learning and educa‑
tion, the approach had been to steer Member States 
to boost the well‑performing ones among these 
measures.

Moreover, the Commission refers to its replies to 
paragraphs 60, 72 and 76.

Recommendation 2 (a)
The Commission accepts this recommendation and 
considers that the current legal framework contains 
the necessary requirements. 

The 2014‑2020 ESIF legal framework already goes 
a long way in providing the conditions for ensur‑
ing better value for money. This is to be achieved, 
inter alia, via a performance framework and reserve, 
ex ante conditionalities and common output and 
result indicators. The use and programming of 
the ESIF are furthermore tightly linked to the EU’s 
strategy for growth and jobs and country‑specific 
recommendations.

Article 30 of the CPR requires that OP amendments 
be accompanied by a justification from the Mem‑
ber State concerning the expected impact on the 
achievement of national Europe 2020 targets as well 
as the OP’s specific objectives. 

In addition, Article 23 of the CPR allows the Com‑
mission, on its initiative, to request that a Member 
State propose amendments to its operational 
programmes with a view to ensuring compliance 
with Council recommendations in the context of 
the European Semester and thus to ensure that the 
ESIF support the relevant growth and jobs priorities 
at national or regional level.

The Commission notes that the supervision of any 
budgetary/absorption issues is also part of the 
Commission's supervision role.

Reply of the Commission 

49

Recommendation 2 (b)
The Commission accepts this recommendation and 
also considers that the current legal framework 
contains the necessary requirements. 

Article 30 of the CPR explicitly requires that upon 
assessment by the Commission of the Member 
State justification and upon a request for further 
information, the Member State shall provide to the 
Commission all necessary additional information. 
In addition, specific additional rules apply to OP 
amendments related to allocation of the perfor‑
mance reserve.

Recommendation 2 (c)
The Commission accepts this recommendation and 
also considers that the current legal framework 
contains the necessary requirements. 

The CPR envisages reporting as part of Article 50 
annual implementation reports on all relevant per‑
formance aspects. The Member States are required 
to report also on the basis of the categories of 
intervention as set out in the relevant Commission 
Implementing Regulation (EU) No 215/2014.

Recommendation 2 (d)
The Commission accepts this recommendation and 
is of the view that this is already current practice, 
given also the specific remit of its participation in 
the monitoring committee.

Common Commission reply to 
paragraphs 85 and 86
Under shared management, Member States are 
responsible for setting up monitoring and reporting 
systems and for ensuring their reliability. 

The Commission checks the reliability of the data 
provided by the Member States through its audits. 

In the 2014‑2020 period the CPR provides for the 
ESF/YEI managing authority to collect, store and 
record reliable data on indicators in a computer‑
ised system (Article 125(2)(a), (d) and (e)), subject to 
audits by the Commission.

Recommendation 3
The Commission accepts this recommendation. 
Indeed, in the context of shared management, 
the Commission checks, among other things, the 
robustness of the systems for recording and stor‑
ing the accounting records and the data on imple‑
mentation provided by the Member States. This is 
done typically through system audit work carried 
out by both the Commission and the national audit 
authorities. 

In the 2014‑2020 period the CPR provides for the 
ESF/YEI managing authority to collect, store and 
record reliable data on indicators in a computerised 
system (Article 125(2)(a), (d), and (e)), subject to 
audits by the Commission.

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In 2012, youth action teams composed of experts from the 
competent national authorities and from the Commission 
were established for the eight Member States 
experiencing particularly high levels of youth 
unemployment. The action teams had the objective of 
helping these Member States make the best use of EU 
structural funding by directing unallocated funds 
(including European Social Funds of around 
10 billion euro) from the 2007–2013 programming period 
to projects that supported job opportunities for young 
people and facilitated access to funding by small 
businesses. 
Through this audit the Court assessed the extent of the 
redirection exercise in relation to the unallocated ESF 
funding and the contribution made by the youth action 
teams in this regard in helping national authorities 
reallocate funds to projects that would make the ‘biggest 
difference in the shortest time’.

EUROPEAN
COURT
OF AUDITORS