Thursday

1st Jun 2023

Parliament questions Solana accounts

The European Parliament on Thursday (23 April) decided to delay until November approval of the Council of the European Union's accounts for 2007, in a bid to gain more financial scrutiny over the bloc's main decision maker.

MEPs hope to gain momentum ahead of the June elections and scrap a "gentlemen's agreement" dating back to 1970, according to which the parliament does not look into the books of the Council, which are checked by the Court of Auditors and national experts.

Read and decide

Join EUobserver today

Become an expert on Europe

Get instant access to all articles — and 20 years of archives. 14-day free trial.

... or subscribe as a group

"That was 39 years ago, when the EU wasn't even called like that, with six member states, a non-elected parliament and way before security and defence policy. To think that it can be prolonged forever is ridiculous," said Danish MEP Soren Bo Sondergaard, who was the parliament's rapporteur for the 2007 EU accounts.

All EU institutions received a green light regarding the way they spent their budget in 2007, except for the Council, an administrative body in charge of organising EU summits, ministerial meetings, ambassadors and expert groups on various topics ranging from fisheries to security and defence.

His report was endorsed by a large majority of MEPs on Thursday, with 571 votes in favour, 41 against and 21 abstentions

If the Council continued to "ignore" the parliament and not submit formal answers to its requests, concerning alleged undisclosed accounts, the legislature could reject the 2007 accounts in November.

This would have "political consequences" for Javier Solana, the EU's top foreign policy chief and also secretary-general of the Council, as well as for future parliamentary debates on budgetary approvals, Mr Sondergaard told this website.

The MEP aims to win back his seat in the June election and stay on as rapporteur for the topic.

The only time the parliament previously rejected the accounts of an EU institution was in 1998, when MEPs refused to sign off the Jacques Santer commission's expenditures, leading to the resignation of the whole body amid serious corruption allegations.

In relation to the Council, however, there is a legal difference. The EU treaty says the parliament checks the accounts of the European Commission, but there is no mention of other EU institutions.

"The Council has nothing to hide and has always favoured transparency in its relation with the parliament on budgetary matters. The Council's budget is managed with the utmost rigour and prudence and is approved by the Court of Auditors and finance ministries of 27 member states," Mr Solana's spokeswoman, Christina Gallach, said.

Council absent from debate

MEPs were outraged at the absence of a Council representative in the plenary debate on Wednesday, which was delayed on purpose to have an EU presidency official present.

The absence was explained by the fact that "responsibility for the implementation of the budget is not a matter for the EU presidency, but for the council's general secretariat," Jan Sliva, spokesman for the Czech EU presidency told this website.

The Council, for its part, pointed to the disputed gentlemen's agreement, basing on which its stance that it could not formally respond to parliamentary requests related to budgetary issues.

Nevertheless, since 2005, the practice of an "informal exchange of views" between the Council's deputy secretary general and a delegation of the committee on budgetary control had been accepted and welcomed by the parliament, which was no longer the case this year, a Council press release states.

No 'black accounts'

The Council also rejected fiery allegations made by MEPs on Wednesday who during the full sitting of the house accused Mr Solana of having "black accounts" and illegally transferring money from interpretation to travel expenses.

Austrian independent MEP Hans Peter Martin called the Council "lazy" and "incompetent," claiming that a lot of ministers don't even attend the meetings and leave decision making to low-level officials.

MEPs insisted that the Council provide the EU legislature with official information and the possibility of looking into documents and papers.

The Council's budget, which amounted to €594 million in 2007, accounts for 0.5 percent of the EU's total budget and eight percent of the bloc's administrative expenditures.

According to the Council, more than half the money was used for paying the salaries and benefits of the 3,200 staff working in the Brussels-based headquarters.

Organising meetings took up some 21 percent of the budget. Most of the expenses are related to interpreting and national delegates travelling to these working group meetings - mostly attended by minor officials from national ministries.

The transfer of some €13 million from interpretation to travel expenses was approved by the Court of Auditors and finance ministers of member states, the Council points out, arguing that it was aimed at saving unspent money.

Transparency initiative welcomed

The parliament's initiative to scrap the gentlemen's agreement was welcomed by Open Europe, a London-based free-market and eurosceptic think-tank.

"MEPs should be credited for finally trying to end the charade whereby the parliament turns a blind eye to the expenditure of the council," Stephen Booth, an analyst at Open Europe, told EUobserver.

"It's about time the parliament took its role as watchdog over the EU's budget seriously. The more steps to bring the EU's opaque budgetary practices from behind closed to doors out into the open, the better," he added.

A new agreement between council and parliament could be negotiated after the new legislature takes office following the June elections.

MEPs to urge block on Hungary taking EU presidency in 2024

"This will be the first time a member state that is under the Article 7 procedure will take over the rotating presidency of the council," French Green MEP Gwendoline Delbos-Corfield, the key lawmaker on Hungary, warned.

European Parliament scales back luxury MEP pension fund

The European Parliament's Bureau, a political body composed of the president and its vice-presidents, decided to slash payouts from the fund by 50 percent, freeze automatic indexations, and increase the pension age from 65 to 67.

WhoisWho? Calls mount to bring back EU directory

NGOs and lobbyists slammed the EU commission for removing contact details of non-managerial staff from its public register, arguing that the institution is now less transparent.

Exclusive

MEP luxury pension held corporate assets in tax havens

While the European Parliament was demanding a clamp down on tax havens, many of its own MEPs were using their monthly office allowances to finance a luxury pension scheme that held corporate assets in the Cayman Islands, Bermuda and elsewhere.

Column

What a Spanish novelist can teach us about communality

In a world where cultural clashes and sectarianism seems to be on the increase, Spanish novelist Javier Cercas (b.1962) takes the opposite approach. He cherishes both life in the big city and in the countryside.

Opinion

Poland and Hungary's ugly divorce over Ukraine

What started in 2015 as a 'friends-with-benefits' relationship between Viktor Orbán and Jarosław Kaczyński, for Hungary and Poland, is ending in disgust and enmity — which will not be overcome until both leaders leave.

Latest News

  1. MEPs pile on pressure for EU to delay Hungary's presidency
  2. IEA: World 'comfortably' on track for renewables target
  3. Europe's TV union wooing Lavrov for splashy interview
  4. ECB: eurozone home prices could see 'disorderly' fall
  5. Adapting to Southern Europe's 'new normal' — from droughts to floods
  6. Want to stop forced migration from West Africa? Start by banning bottom trawling
  7. Germany unsure if Orbán fit to be 'EU president'
  8. EU Parliament chief given report on MEP abuse 30 weeks before sanction

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. International Sustainable Finance CentreJoin CEE Sustainable Finance Summit, 15 – 19 May 2023, high-level event for finance & business
  2. ICLEISeven actionable measures to make food procurement in Europe more sustainable
  3. World BankWorld Bank Report Highlights Role of Human Development for a Successful Green Transition in Europe
  4. Nordic Council of MinistersNordic summit to step up the fight against food loss and waste
  5. Nordic Council of MinistersThink-tank: Strengthen co-operation around tech giants’ influence in the Nordics
  6. EFBWWEFBWW calls for the EC to stop exploitation in subcontracting chains

Stakeholders' Highlights

  1. InformaConnecting Expert Industry-Leaders, Top Suppliers, and Inquiring Buyers all in one space - visit Battery Show Europe.
  2. EFBWWEFBWW and FIEC do not agree to any exemptions to mandatory prior notifications in construction
  3. Nordic Council of MinistersNordic and Baltic ways to prevent gender-based violence
  4. Nordic Council of MinistersCSW67: Economic gender equality now! Nordic ways to close the pension gap
  5. Nordic Council of MinistersCSW67: Pushing back the push-back - Nordic solutions to online gender-based violence
  6. Nordic Council of MinistersCSW67: The Nordics are ready to push for gender equality

Join EUobserver

Support quality EU news

Join us