The European Court of Auditors checks that European funds are spent in line with EU rules. It was chartered with auditing the books of 41 European institutions and eight “joint undertakings and European schools”.
On 10 October, the ECA said in a news announcement that:
“The auditors concluded that the final 2016 accounts of all nine agencies, comprising the financial statements and the reports on the implementation of the budget, were based on international public-sector accounting standards and presented fairly, in all material respects, their financial standing at the end of 2016, the results of their operations, cash flows and changes in net assets for the year. They also concluded that the transactions related to their annual accounts for 2016, both revenue and payments, complied with the relevant rules in all material respects.”
Reports were issued on Tuesday for these 9 entities:
- EIOPA - European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (Frankfurt)
- EASME - Executive Agency for Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (Brussels)
- INEA - Innovation and Networks Executive Agency (Brussels)
- EACEA - Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency (Brussels)
- CHAFEA - Consumers, Health, Agriculture and Food Executive Agency (Luxembourg)
- EURATOM - Euratom Supply Agency (Luxembourg)
- OSHA - European Agency for Safety and Health at Work (Bilbao)
- EUROFOUND - European foundation for improvement of living & working conditions (Dublin)
- ERA - European Railway Safety Agency (Valenciennes)
Annual audit reports for the remaining EU outfits are expected to be released in mid-November.
Irregular spending across the entire EU budget dropped from 3.8% of payments in 2015 to 3.1% in 2016, the ECA said on 27 September.
The ECA is based in Kirchberg and employs around 900 staff members.