Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2000-04-11-Speech-2-053"
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"en.20000411.3.2-053"2
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"Mr President, the new Commission is not responsible for matters from the past, but it is to be judged on the basis of its willingness to straighten out its affairs. So far, it has not shown much desire to do so. The Commission has put the lid on the issue, and it has been impossible to obtain the necessary information. The Commission maintains that the matters in question do not fall under the 1998 discharge. That is not the case. All these matters surfaced in 1998 and they should therefore, of course, also be dealt with under the 1998 discharge. The Commission has, on the whole, employed many dodges to avoid responding to our questions, and that is completely unacceptable. The Treaty is clear: in accordance with Article 276, Parliament is entitled to obtain all necessary information in connection with the discharge procedure. I should like to give an example. In accordance with general practice, I, as the rapporteur responsible for the subject of development aid, sent the Commission a questionnaire concerning ECHO. It was sent to the Commission in November. Only in March did I receive an answer in which, moreover, I was told to take a running jump. In the meantime, Mrs Fontaine received a letter from Mr Prodi, stating that the Commission was tired of answering all the stupid questions from the Committee on Budgetary Control. Excuse me but, either the man has been out in the sun too long or he must have some incredibly bad advisers. The Commission is obliged to answer our questions, irrespective of whether or not it likes the content of these. Until they understand this, I think we should postpone granting discharge. I hope the Commission will take our demands seriously. If they do not, we shall be ready to send them on a very long holiday in May.
I should like to explain what the ECHO case is about. First and foremost, I should like to emphasise that this is not a smear campaign directed against individuals, but a question of putting matters in order. What signal is being sent out to present and future leaders of the Commission when the people responsible escape indictment? The ECHO scandal has still not led to any repercussions. The case is at present before the Court of Justice in Luxembourg which admits that nothing will probably come of the case and that it will no doubt refer it to the Belgian authorities in a couple of years’ time. The problem is that the ECHO case is not about property crime. It is about gross negligence and about an official who has taken decisions without regard to the finance regulation. The decision to exonerate the previous director was taken by the previous Commission, and this was a political decision pure and simple. Now, the Commission has until 15 May to solve the problem. If they do not come up with satisfactory solutions, I shall campaign for our obtaining a parliamentary committee of inquiry which can examine the matter in depth. I also think it is a good idea to look a little more closely at the discharge for the development fund. There are still unresolved demands but, if we postpone granting the discharge, this will be accompanied by clear demands upon the Commission. The Commission’s delegations have failed. There are several examples of cases where they could have prevented fraud if they had been just a little observant. Unfortunately, there are too many delegations which are just there for the ride. I have therefore asked permission to prepare an own-initiative report so that we can have these issues clarified. The final thing I want to say is that the Commission should undertake to refer the fraud cases to OLAF. I obtained 11 reports under Pentagon-like conditions, but OLAF still does not know anything about these. I therefore think it is time that these matters were tidied up, and I am pleased that Mr Nielson has now shown that he wants to get this process under way. I look forward to seeing the results."@en1
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