91999E0504

WRITTEN QUESTION E-0504/99

by Ursula Stenzel (PPE) to the Commission

(8 March 1999)

Subject: Leonardo

The contract with AGENOR as the technical assistance bureau for the Leonardo programme has not been extended by the Commission.

1. Can the Commission say why it has persistently rejected all accusations and inquiries concerning the administration of Leonardo?

2. Can it explain how it came to the conclusion that there was nothing criminal in the irregularities found in the administration of Leonardo, when the UCLAF has identified considerable damage to the Communities?

3. What does it think of the impression which has arisen that it did not proceed satisfactorily or conscientiously in its appraisal of the TAB for Leonardo (Agenor)?

Answer given by Mrs Cresson on behalf of the Commission

(7 May 1999)

1. The Technical Assistance Bureau (TAB) for the Leonardo programme has been audited annually by the competent Director-General, leading to the non-reimbursement of expenditure deemed to be ineligible. An audit has also been performed by the Commission's Financial Control, following which Financial Control recommended that the contract with Agenor should not be renewed unless it was amended and unless the TAB was radically overhauled (including replacement of the director). In the meantime, the contract with Agenor was merely extended, with the insertion of more stringent terms, for two successive four-month periods, the last of which expired on 31 January 1999. The audits in question did not call into question the programme as such, but rather the internal operation of the bureau that assisted the Commission.

2. The Financial Control's audit report, with the replies from the competent Directorate-General, was finalised in December 1998. The Commission did not come to the conclusion mentioned by the Honourable Member. Indeed, on 10 February 1999, it drew the attention of the judicial authorities (Brussels public prosecutor) to four cases with potentially criminal implications (two of these had given rise to a refusal to grant reimbursement by the competent Directorate-General, following its own audits).

3. At the end of each of the two first years, the competent Directorate-General performed an audit, following which any expenditure deemed to be unjustified was not reimbursed to Agenor. Likewise, the third year was audited by Financial Control. Following these a posteriori audits, the Commission had, during the first temporary extension of the contract, tightened up various terms of the contract with Agenor. Finally, it did not renew the contract for a fourth year and would only have renewed the contract expiring on 31 January 1999 if the TAB restructuring operation it had requested Agenor to perform had provided the assurance that the irregularities ascertained would be eliminated.