Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2003-11-18-Speech-2-027"
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"en.20031118.2.2-027"2
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"Mr President, it was a good thing, Mr Prodi, that you attended the Committee on Budgetary Control this morning, and it is important to say so. As a matter of principle, I would like to draw attention to the PSE Group’s concerns about the Eurostat affair, but about other issues as well. It is not good if the Commission always needs a new scandal before it takes a further step along its road to reform. This is constant grist to Mr Bonde’s mill – if I may be so bold as to name names – and he makes political capital out of it. That is one lesson the Commission should learn.
Let me now turn to some individual points. I greatly welcome your announcement this morning that the information channels between OLAF and the Commission are to be reviewed. That is necessary. However – and let me speak plainly – this must include answering the question how the Commission deals internally with information from OLAF, so that this information is not simply buried in the files without anyone knowing about it while everyone has their knives out for the Commission.
I also welcome the fact that when asked, you clarified to the Commission on Budgetary Control that your proposals on the reform of OLAF do not imply that you are questioning or restricting OLAF’s responsibility for internal investigations. That is very important, for it would have resulted in a major clash with this House. We want to see OLAF as an independent agency, especially in light of the internal investigations, and so I welcome your clarifying this point to the Committee on Budgetary Control and urge you to continue along this course.
Let me comment on the issue of political responsibility. We have always adopted the position that the Commissioners should also be able to exercise this responsibility. Based on your statement this morning and the fact that a supplement to the Code of Conduct has again become necessary – describing how the Commissioners themselves should ask questions and how the services and the Directorates-General should be obliged to inform the Commissioners about problems, or landmines – I can only assume that this has not been set down on paper or been common practice. That was how we analysed the situation in July. However, the time has come to learn lessons from this. We want a radical reform of the relations between the Directorates-General and the Commissioners, and we will scrutinise your proposals to see whether they match these requirements."@en1
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