Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2008-02-18-Speech-1-114"

Predicate	Value (sorted: default)
rdf:type	lpv_eu:Speech2
dcterms:Date	"2008-02-18"^^xsd:date2
dcterms:Is Part Of	lp_eu:Protection of the Communities’ financial interests – Fight against fraud – Annual reports 2005 and 2006 (debate)2
dcterms:Language	"nl"^^xsd:language2
lpv:document identification number	"en.20080218.22.1-114"2
lpv:hasSubsequent	lp_eu:2008-02-18-Speech-1-1152
lpv:speaker	lp:Bart Staes2
lpv:spokenAs	substitute; Delegation to the EU-Kazakhstan, EU-Kyrgyzstan and EU-Uzbekistan Parliamentary Cooperation Committees, and for relations with Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Mongolia (2004-09-15--2009-07-13)3 unknown; Groen (2004-07-20--2009-07-13)3 member; G/EFA (2004-07-20--2009-07-13)3 substitute; ENVI (2007-01-31--2009-07-13)3 substitute; Temporary Committee on Climate Change (2007-05-10--2009-02-04)3 member; Delegation to the EU-Russia Parliamentary Cooperation Committee (2004-09-15--2009-07-13)3 substitute; REGI (2007-01-31--2009-07-13)3 member; CONT (2007-01-31--2009-07-13)3
lpv:translated text	"Mr President, the Commissioner said the same thing: the report does indeed overlap with the discharge procedure. In this sense, too, this debate is a warm-up act for the hearing next week with Commissioners Špidla and Hübner. We know the figures for reported irregularities. They do not tell the whole story, of course, but they do tell us a lot about the problems reported in the policy areas of own resources, agriculture and the Structural Funds. The report mentions a total of EUR 1.1 billion worth of reported irregularities and the trend is upward. We are back to the level of 2002, following better figures in 2003, 2004 and 2005. Agriculture is doing relatively well. The problem sectors are clearly own resources and the Structural Funds: own resources accounted for EUR 325 million of reported irregularities and the Structural Funds accounted for EUR 700 million. Within the Structural Funds, five Member States accounted for 84% of the reported irregularities. Anyone who is interested can read which countries they are in Mr Musotto’s report. It really is quite remarkable. It also has to be remembered that in the period before 2006, another EUR 1 billion of resources had yet to be recovered and that the Court of Auditors says that 12% of the Structural Funds in 2006 could not be paid out. This is the context in which the present discharge procedure is taking place and it is a cause of great concern to us. We will come back to this. As far as own resources are concerned, the problem of cigarette fraud is being tackled properly. We had the agreement with Philip Morris. There is a new agreement with Japan Tobacco, which should deliver a lot of money and will also bring about a reduction in smuggling. The main problem area in own resources is the VAT ‘carrousel’ transactions. The figures are quoted: enormous amounts are involved, running into billions of euros. An investigation by the British House of Lords highlights this further. I am pleased that Parliament is tackling this. The Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs has already organised a hearing and the Committee on Budgetary Control will do the same on 4 or 5 May. I hope that I, as rapporteur, will be able to produce as good a report on the VAT carrousels as my report on cigarette fraud."@en1

Named graphs describing this resource:

The resource appears as object in 2 triples

Context graph