Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-03-27-Speech-4-053"
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"en.20030327.2.4-053"2
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"Mr President, I want to congratulate Mrs Theato on her report. I believe she has crystallised a lot of the hard work that has gone into this subject. She has proposed what I think to be a convincing case to the European Convention for inclusion of this provision in an amended treaty.
In discussing this matter, we should not create the feeling – which some people have done and have been trying to do – that, in some way or another, the European Union's treasury is a more leaky vessel than those of the Member States or similar treasuries throughout the world. We are no better or no worse, but we do compare with the higher standards of accountancy and accountability.
On the other hand, most of the arguments that are put forward against this idea are political, ideological arguments. The arguments sought to stir up the people who are concerned about a transfer of power and competences from national parliaments to Europe and the creation of more unnecessary bureaucracy. I do not see it this way at all. We have transferred to this Union 1% of our national taxation, which is used in the interest of Community policies. We have provided the financial control to deal with that. We have provided OLAF to further investigate suspected problems. But we do not take the final step, which is to create the means to prosecute people who we have found guilty of violating our laws. I have experienced this in my everyday life; I have seen cases in which companies and individuals have been found guilty of abusing Community funds. I have seen situations where a large number of people from a particular sector, which is well financed by the Union, seem to be able continuously to get away with violations of our rules and regulations on the spending of money. In one case, I see the public taxpayer in a Member State being forced to pay through the clearance of accounts for the crimes of individual companies. In other situations, I see the failure to pay levies whereby the national government, again, picks up the bill.
If we had a European Prosecutor dealing with our own resources – we do not want to take it any further than that – I think the focus of the authorities in the Member States who actually spend this money would be sharpened. I also think that OLAF would be less frustrated when, after having proceeded and found situations serious enough to be passed on to Public Prosecutors at national level, it does not happen. If we had a European Prosecutor, we could satisfy our taxpayers that we were taking matters to the proper conclusion."@en1
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