Last November, the European Court of Auditors published its report on the implementation of the 2010 EU Budget. It is well known that the Court has refused to sign off on how the money from the EU's 2010 budget had been spent. In this report, the Court also criticized the way the European Parliament has been managing its subsidy scheme for visitors’ groups.
The European Parliament grants subsidies for compensation for travel expenses to groups of visitors. The Court noted that “the amount is calculated on the basis of the number of visitors and the average return distance the group has to travel, valued at the standard cost of an individual trip by private car.” However, according to the Court “The procedures in place do not require groups to provide evidence of the actual travel costs incurred, resulting in a risk of overpayment as most groups use cheaper collective transport rather than individual means of transport.”
Moreover, the Court noted that “the practice of allowing the compensation to be paid to the designated leader of the group in cash rather than by bank transfer limits the possibilty of applying internal control procedures to these transactions.”
The Court found payments amounting to a total €55,236 were made to groups in four out of six cases audited. Hence, in 2010, 78 % of total payments were made in cash to group leaders.
The European Parliament replied to the Court saying, “Controlling the actual cost of the journeys would be complex, time-consuming and would entail the deployment of a significant amount of additional human resources within the concerned unit, which Parliament considers to be disproportionate to the risk of overpayment entailed.”
The EuropeanVoice has recently reported that the European Parliament’s bureau have decided that all subsidies for compensation for travel expenses to groups of visitors “should be paid by bank transfer or in cash” but “Parliament staff have discretion on how payments are made, and on what should be reimbursed.”
