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 However, at a time when national governments under pressure from
Eurosceptic parties denouncing waste in Brussels, the European Court
of Auditors criticized member states' failure to curb fraudulent and
other unjustified claims for EU cash and praised the commission's
efforts to claw back misdirected funds.
Signing off on its audit of the 148.5 billion euros ($186 billion)
of EU spending last year, the court put its estimated "error rate" -
a statistical measure of what was spent in breach of EU rules - at
between 3.5 percent and 5.9 percent, giving a headline rate in the
middle of the range of 4.7 percent, similar to 2012.
That reflects an improvement on the 6.9 percent recorded in 2007,
but exceeds levels seen in 2009-11 below 4 percent.
In big net contributor states, like Germany and especially Britain,
accounts of fraud, waste and inefficiency may fuel new grumbling
about the EU.
British Prime Minister David Cameron, who plans a referendum on
membership, is this week fighting a revision in states'
contributions to the EU budget that has seen London presented with a
bill for an extra 2 billion euros.
In the 1,200 or so sample cases tracked by auditors, they found
irregularities of some kind in over 40 percent - including over half
of those in the biggest parts of the budget, devoted to the likes of
regional infrastructure and farm subsidies.
"There has to be more careful management and control of EU funds,"
Court of Auditors President Vitor Caldeira said. "If European Union
citizens do not have a clear perception of the added value of EU
spending, we will not have their trust."
In regards to the EU executive led by Jean-Claude Juncker which took
office this week for the next five years, Caldeira said: "This new
commission is a golden opportunity to move from a spending culture
to a performance culture."
INCENTIVES
The court noted that in such areas of spending, which account for
much of a budget that makes up about 2 percent of public
expenditures across the 28-member bloc, national officials manage
much of the payment systems. It found misspending higher in such
areas than in budgets managed solely by the commission.
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Among other examples, it cited the case of a Sardinian artichoke
grower being found using harmful pesticides while claiming EU
compensation for eschewing their use, a German airport contract
awarded with EU support without tender rules having been followed
and Scottish farmers claiming EU subsidies while not meeting rules
for the notification of movement of livestock.
Officials say national governments have little incentive to halt
payments that would reduce the EU funds flowing to their country.
Caldeira called for an effort to introduce incentives for curbing
misspending and for directing money to those ends that do most to
fulfil EU goals, such as creating jobs.
The auditors did not single out member states for criticism, saying
they found misspending across the euro zone, adding that in a large
proportion of cases national officials should have seen mistakes by
simply looking at information they already held.
The court also welcomed efforts by the commission to correct errors
and recover funds, estimating that without this action, misspending
would have been 6.2 percent of total spending rather than 4.7
percent.
(Editing by G Crosse)
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