Activities of Mikuláš PEKSA related to 2020/2246(INI)
Shadow reports (1)
REPORT on the protection of the EU’s financial interests – combating fraud – annual report 2019
Amendments (14)
Amendment 9 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1
Paragraph 1
1. Welcomes the 31st Annual report on the protection of the EU’s financial interests and the fight against fraud, which underlines the achievements of 2019 with regards to the consolidation of the institutional framework on the fight against fraud and irregularities at Union level achieved by the transposition into national law by 12 Member States of the measures provided for in the Directive on the fight against fraud to the Union’s financial interests by means of criminal law (‘the PIF Directive’), with the remaininghile 22 Member States doingid so by June 2020; regrets that the Commission had to send reasoned opinions to Ireland and Romania on 3 December 2020 for failing to transpose into national law the PIF Directive;
Amendment 26 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6
Paragraph 6
6. Urges Member States together with the Commission to cooperate more closely with regard to exchanges of information, improving data collection, and enhancing the effectiveness of controls; in this regard calls on Member States to publish data on final beneficiaries in an uniform machine-readable format and ensure the interoperability with the Commission monitoring tools;
Amendment 29 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9
Paragraph 9
9. Notes from the 2020 VAT Gap Report that in 2018 the EU VAT Gap dropped to EUR 140 billion and could fall below EUR 130 billion in 2019; however, is concerned that the VAT Gap may reach EUR 164 billion in 2020 dueand asks the Commission for a thorough explanation on whether this increase was anyhow related to the COVID-19 pandemic;
Amendment 32 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 11
Paragraph 11
11. Notes that between 2017 and 2019 the Commission carried out on-the-spot inspections on the control strategy in the field of customs value in all Member States and found that the Union’s financial interests were not effectively protected, leading to significant losses of Traditional Own Resources to the EU budget; Notes that OLAF has issued investigation reports with recommendations to six Member States which have not fully implemented the necessary measures to tackle undervaluation fraud consistently; calls on the Commission to report back to the Parliament specifically naming the Member States which could share their best practice and also those where significant challenges remain;
Amendment 33 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 12
Paragraph 12
12. Notes that solar panels were the goods most affected by fraud and irregularities in monetary terms in 2019, as was also the case in 2018, and 2017; calls on the Commission andto recognise the systemic nature of such fraud, fully informs the Council and together with Member States to takes strong action in this regard;
Amendment 37 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 14
Paragraph 14
14. Reiterates that a combination of different detection methods (release controls, post-release controls, inspections by anti-fraud services and others) is most efficient for detecting fraud, and that the efficiency of each method depends on the Member State concerned, the efficient coordination of its administration, and the ability of the relevant Member State services to communicate with each other; calls on the Commission to inform the Council which member States could share their 'best practice' experience and where significant challenges for improvements remain;
Amendment 42 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 19
Paragraph 19
19. Notes the complexity of the analysis on cohesion policy’s data and the different phases of PPs 2007-2013, notes that the financial amounts reported are significantly lower than the exceptional year of 2018 but on average are trending upwards for the Cohesion Fund; underlines the importance of cooperation with the judicial authorities and considers the need for closer attention to the unexpected downturn of fraudulent irregularities as well as non-fraudulent, excluding ‘exceptional’ cases, for PP 2014-2020 in 2019 of the financial amounts involved in fraudulent irregularities for all funds and in particular regarding the ERDF; notes, moreover, thestresses an urgent need for the Commission, the OLAF and the EPPO to fully investigate if Member States’ different reporting patterns in terms of their tendency to detect fraudulent irregularities with high financial amounts involved are somehow related to possible conflicts of interests of Member States' stakeholders or even criminal activity;
Amendment 47 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 20
Paragraph 20
20. Reiterates the transparency requirements for CAP and cohesion policies, which oblige the responsible authorities of the Member States to maintain a publicly available list of final beneficiaries; strongly calls on Member States to publish such data in an uniform machine- readable format and ensure the interoperability of the information; calls ondemands that the Commission to collects and aggregates the data and publish lists of the largest beneficiaries from each fund in each Member State;
Amendment 48 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 21
Paragraph 21
21. Notes that in 2019 actions related to health infrastructure were affected by breaches of public procurement rules; among the fraudulent irregularities the most common issues detected concerned supporting documents; fifteen Member States reported irregularities in actions related to health infrastructures; seven of these also detected fraud; notes that non- reporting of irregularities in this area by other Member States is not an indication that they awere not affected by such risks and calls on the Commission, the OLAF and the EPPO that fraudulent activities, especially those related to fighting the COVID-19 pandemic do not remain unresolved;
Amendment 68 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 23
Paragraph 23
23. Stresses the importance of prioritising the development and establishment of National Anti-Fraud Strategies (NAFSs) by all Member States, also in the light of the new challenges of the COVID-19 crisis and the Recovery and Resilience Plans; is concerned that Sixteen Member States have not yet adopted a NAFS; calls on Member States who have not yet adopted a NAFS to do so without delay;
Amendment 79 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 27 a (new)
Paragraph 27 a (new)
27 a. Urges the five Member States that have not yet joined the EPPO to do so without undue delay; regrets that Finland and Slovenia have so far failed to put forward suitable European prosecutors to join the Office; recalls that the prosecutors must be independent from national influence; is concerned that the Council decided not to follow the recommendations by the European selection panel when appointing several prosecutors;
Amendment 84 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 27 b (new)
Paragraph 27 b (new)
27 b. Asks the Commission to increase the EPPO’s financial and staff resources to enable it to tackle the challenges that will arise from the spending of the exceptionally large recovery fund;
Amendment 108 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 33
Paragraph 33
33. Stresses the importance of the Early Detection and Exclusion System (EDES); invites the Commission to analyse the impact of a possible extension of EDES to shared managementrequest an extension of EDES to shared management in the upcoming review of the Financial Regulation; asks the Commission to provide this system with the necessary financial and staff resources to operate on a full time basis;
Amendment 123 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 37
Paragraph 37
37. NoteRegrets that only 13 Member States made use of ARACHNE during their risk analysis; reiterates the importance of this tool, as well as of interoperability of IT systems and databases for fraud risk analysis and fraud detection purposes; reiterates its call on the Commission to consider makingmake the use of ARACHNE mandatory;