To recall, in 2004, the Commission put forward a similar proposal, but, at that time, the Member States could not agree to grant auditing powers to Eurostat. But presently, taking into account the current Greek situation and the lack of reliability of Greece’s public finance statistics, Member States are willing to have Eurostat and the Commission interfering in matters of their competence.
Eurostat would be, therefore, entitled to examine Member States’ public accounts so it can verify the data provided. Under the amended Regulation Eurostat would have access to all “the information required for the purposes of the data quality assessment” and not just statistical information. Moreover, there would be more “regular statistical visits” and "in-depth methodological visits” in Member States. The methodological visits would go, therefore, beyond the “purely statistical data” as their purpose will be to verify the public accounts.
Eurostat would have access “to the accounts of government entities at central, state, local and social security levels.”
Under the Regulation the methodological visits would only be carried out in “exceptional cases where significant risks or problems with the quality of the data have been clearly identified." The Commission’s draft proposal did not provide a definition of “significant risks and problems.” This provision has been improved compared to the Commission's proposal, as the Council included in the text examples where could be considered that there are significant risks or problems with the quality of the data notified by a Member State such as “frequent and sizeable revisions of the deficit or debt that are not clearly and adequately explained”, the Member State concerned has not sent to Eurostat all the statistical information requested, “the Member State concerned changes, unilaterally and without a clear explanation, the sources and methods for estimating the deficit and debts of the general government set out in the Inventory, with a material effect on estimate.” There would be also “significant risks and problems” in case of “outstanding methodological issues likely to have a material effect on the debt or deficit statistics which have not been resolved between the Member State and …Eurostat…” as well as in case of “persistent, unusually high stock-flow adjustments not clearly explained.” Nevertheless, this provision would be ultimately interpreted by the ECJ. It is not crystal clear that Eurostat would not be able to directly compile statistics or control their production in the Member States.
Whereas presently Member States may, voluntarily, provide the assistance of experts in national accounting, at Eurostat request, under the Commission draft proposal, they would be obliged to provide such assistance for the preparation and undertaking of the methodological visits. The Council has amended this provision and Member States are expected to provide the assistance of experts in national accounting on a voluntary basis.
