Marta Andreasen resigns as Treasurer

Marta Andreasen, UKIP's Treasurer and a UKIP MEP for the South West euroregion, has resigned from her post as Treasurer after a falling out with Paul Nuttall, the party chairman.

Andreasen and Nuttall have apparently had a disagreement over the decision to double the salary of a party official. The NEC agreed to the salary increase and Nuttall awarded it in defiance of Andreasen's objections.

This is a tricky one because ultimately such decisions are down to the Chairman and the NEC but the money man (or woman in this case) generally gets a big say in the matter because there's money involved. I suspect there's more to it than a disagreement over money but I don't necessarily see this as a bad thing. It was positive to have Marta Andreasen as the party Treasurer with her sleaze-busting credentials but I commented at the time of the announcement she was standing as an MEP that I didn't see how she would be able to do the job of an MEP and the job of a Treasurer. Now she can concentrate on being an MEP and we can get a full-time Treasurer.

UKIP's enemies (of which there are many, especially in the LibLabCon-controlled media) will try to paint this as a damning endictment of UKIP and the party's finances but it's clear that Marta Andreasen has resigned as Treasurer, not from the party and because of a disagreement over money, not because she has uncovered fraud.

Rattling cages

I think UKIP (and especially Marta Andreassen getting elected) may have got a few people worried...

Hampshire UKIP Public Meeting - Winchester

Hampshire-wide public meeting and rally with speakers Nigel Farage, Marta Andreason and Christopher Gill.

Tuesday, 26th May 2009 at 7.30pm

Winchester Guildhall, High Street, Winchester, SO23 9GH - in the Main Conference Chamber.

EU’s ‘Nemesis’ Comes to Norwich - - Former Chief Accountant to talk to local businesses -

Marta Andreasen, the European Union’s former Chief Accountant who was famously sacked by Neil Kinnock for refusing to approve the EU’s accounts because they were not properly prepared and wide open to fraud, will be in Norwich on Wednesday (11.2.09) for talks with local businesses and to give a speech at a fundraising dinner for the UK Independence Party, in Reepham. Ms Andreasen is also standing for UKIP in the South East, at the European Election later this year and may well return to haunt the EU.

David Campbell Bannerman, UKIP’s Deputy Leader and lead prospective candidate for the European Election in the East of England said: “I am delighted that Marta is going to be with us on Wednesday. She is a very courageous lady, who refused to compromise her principles in the face of major intimidation by the EU’s bureaucracy, which took a very dim view of her honesty and her attempt to expose the serious flaws in the accounting systems. I sincerely hope Marta will be elected in June and, using that platform, can continue to be the EU’s nemesis. With the EU’s accounts not being properly signed off by the auditors for 14 consecutive years, her knowledge and experience are badly needed to help UKIP to expose the fraud and corruption endemic in the EU’s finances.”

On Wednesday evening, Ms Andreasen will be joining local businessmen and key players from UKIP, including the sitting MEP for the East of England, Jeffrey Titford for a fundraising dinner hosted by Sir John White at his home in Reepham. Also present will be UKIP Peer Lord Pearson of Rannoch and prospective MEP candidate Stuart Agnew.

UKIP Public Meeting - Buckingham University

A Public meeting will be held at the Buckingham Unviversity on behalf of UKIP Buckingham. Guest Speakers: Nigel Farage MEP, Marta Andreasen, Steve Harris, Dave Fowler, Chris Adams.

24th February 2009: 7pm - 9.30pm Buckingham University, Chandos Road, Buckingham, MK18 1EG

Everyone welcome. Videos shown, refreshments available.
Meet all the Buckingham County Council UKIP Candidates. Every Seat filled for UKIP

For more info: Telephone Chris Adams on 0798 6543211

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."

The Brussels accounts scandal must be stopped -by Marta Andreassen

We have a right to know where the EU's millions end up.Here we go again. Today, for the 14th year in a row, the European Court of Auditors will unveil their report, telling us that they refuse to clear the EU accounts. What's worse, no one will really seem to care. We are told that the accounts won't be cleared until 2020 - if then.

Having worked inside the Brussels nomenklatura and having being sacked for my insistence that financial controls have to be strengthened, I am not surprised to find that nothing has changed other than the arguments deployed to defend this state of affairs. What the auditors have been saying for years is that most of the payments made by the Commission from its £70 billion-a- year budget cannot be deemed legal or regular. That is, that they cannot confirm those payments have been made to the correct person for the correct purpose and for the correct amount. It stretches credulity to insist, as the Europhiles do, that this does not mean that there is fraud.

Because the payments are made to beneficiaries in the member countries it's easy enough for the institutions to put the blame on those recipients. Which is what they do, claiming that the problem is one of insufficient attention being paid to the paperwork. But who designed the paperwork that no one understands or completes? And who doesn't insist on it being completed? The institutions themselves, of course. Because this control is missing there is no way to protect against fraud or even to uncover it.We might not expect the European Union to be whiter than white, but we should at least hold them to the standard of being competent. Who is to blame for this situation? The Members of the European Parliament. For those 14 years they've been allowing this situation to continue.

It's not just that too many have gone native, dreaming of their part in constructing that shimmering vision of “Europe”. It's that they've forgotten what a Parliament is for, which is not simply to pass legislation, but to hold those who implement it to account. Only a complete cynic would note that those who do complain, those who do insist that this situation must change, start to find their own activities, their own expense accounts, say, subjected to audits of much greater detailed scrutiny than are applied to the accounts as a whole.

The Euro-elections in June 2009 offer the public a chance to elect those who will defend their interests, who will insist on controlling where their money is going. The EU costs Britons £40 million a day and we all deserve that so much of what is ours is not wasted in fraud.

Marta Andreassen was the chief accountant for the European Commission but was sacked for exposing the corruption of the EU. She is standing for the UK Independence Party in the SE Region for the 2009 Euro elections.