EU budget: the missing €6 billion

Via UKIP.org

After 14 years of trying, the European Union has finally managed to have its budget passed – even though the auditors say they have no idea where €6 billion have gone

The European Court of Auditors said it had signed off the budget, to which the UK contributes £40 million a day, but it added that it could not trace the missing €6 billion.

UKIP MEP Jeffrey Titford, who sits on the Budgetary Committee of the European Parliament, said it was beyond belief that with so much public money missing the budget had still been passed.

Marta Andreassen, a former chief accountant for the EU and now a UKIP candidate for the 2009 Euro-elections, said the systems of financial control were so complex that the auditors had no way of telling where fraud began or ended.

Following the release of the ECA report, UKIP issued a statement in which it said:

"The report claims to have passed the accounts in an 'unqualified' way and yet it also states that 'the Court cannot provide a clean opinion.' The truth is that the ECA is a European institution and therefore has been politicised in order that it sanitise the devastating truth about the accounts."

Eastern Counties MEP Jeffrey Titford added: "Year after year the European Parliament goes through the motions of considering the Court of Auditor's report and its failure to approve the EU's accounts, and each time, over the strenuous objections of a tiny minority of people like myself, the Parliament tamely nods through the accounts.

"Fourteen years of failure, 14 years of grotesque mismanagement of public money and 14 years of mealy-mouthed acquiescence by most British MEPs is enough. If any British MEP either votes to approve the EU's 2007 accounts or abstains from the vote, then his or her party should not receive a single vote in next year's European parliamentary election. The politicians are failing us, therefore, it is time for the public to act by holding them responsible at the ballot box."

Marta Andreassen said the ECA had asserted without room for doubt that they had found at least €6 billion to have been wrongly paid out in 2007 from the European Union Budget. The court said it did not imply the transactions were illegal or irregular, or that there was fraud, Mrs Andreassen went on. They added that "only if funds have intentionally been improperly claimed can we talk about fraud." But the court had failed to produce an analysis on the intentionality of the improper claims.

"They confirm that the improvements said to have been made in the control of the use of EU funds do not change the overall negative opinion given in prior years.

"The court confirms that it is the Commission that retains overall responsibility for the execution of the budget and is accountable for this to the European Parliament and Council. So, can we please ask the European Parliament and the Council to call the Commission to account for their persistent failure in managing European taxpayers' money."