15.12.2012   

EN

Official Journal of the European Union

C 388/1

1.

The European Agency for Cooperation of Energy Regulators (hereinafter "the Agency"), which is located in Ljublana, was created by Regulation (EC) No 713/2009 of the European Parliament and of the Council (1). The Agency's main task is to assist National Regulatory Authorities in exercising, at Union level, the regulatory tasks that they perform in the Member States and, where necessary, to coordinate their action. Under the REMIT regulation (2) the Agency is given new additional responsibilities, together with national regulatory authorities, regarding the monitoring of the European wholesale energy market (3).

2.

The Commission granted financial autonomy to the Agency on 8 March 2011. The audited period for the 2011 financial year therefore runs from 8 March to 31 December 2011.

3.

The audit approach taken by the Court comprises analytical audit procedures, direct testing of transactions and an assessment of key controls of the Agency's supervisory and control systems. This is supplemented by evidence provided by the work of other auditors (where relevant) and an analysis of management representations.

4.

Pursuant to the provisions of Article 287 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union, the Court has audited the annual accounts (4) of the Agency, which comprise the “financial statements” (5) and the “reports on the implementation of the budget” (6) for the financial year ended 31 December 2011, and the legality and regularity of the transactions underlying those accounts.

5.

As authorising officer, the Director implements the revenue and expenditure of the budget in accordance with the financial rules of the Agency, under his own responsibility and within the limits of the authorised appropriations (7). The Director is responsible for putting in place (8) the organisational structure and the internal management and control systems and procedures relevant for drawing up final accounts (9) that are free from material misstatement, whether due to fraud or error, and for ensuring that the transactions underlying those accounts are legal and regular.

6.

The Court’s responsibility is to provide, on the basis of its audit, the European Parliament and the Council (10) with a statement of assurance as to the reliability of the annual accounts of the Agency and the legality and regularity of the transactions underlying them.

7.

The Court conducted its audit in accordance with the IFAC International Standards on Auditing and Codes of Ethics and the INTOSAI International Standards of Supreme Audit Institutions. These standards require that the Court plans and performs the audit to obtain reasonable assurance as to whether the annual accounts of the Agency are free of material misstatement and the transactions underlying them are legal and regular.

8.

An audit involves performing procedures to obtain audit evidence about the amounts and disclosures in the accounts and the legality and regularity of the transactions underlying them. The procedures are selected based on the auditor’s judgment, including an assessment of the risks of material misstatement of the accounts and of material non-compliance of the underlying transactions with the requirement of the legal framework of the European Union, whether due to fraud or error. In assessing those risks, the auditor considers internal controls relevant to the preparation and fair presentation of the accounts and supervisory and control systems implemented to ensure legality and regularity of underlying transactions, in order to design audit procedures that are appropriate in the circumstances. An audit also includes evaluating the appropriateness of accounting policies used and reasonableness of accounting estimates made, as well as evaluating the overall presentation of the accounts.

9.

The Court considers that the audit evidence obtained is sufficient and appropriate to provide a basis for the opinions set out below.

10.

In the Court’s opinion, the Agency's Annual Accounts (11) present fairly, in all material respects, its financial position as of 31 December 2011 and the results of its operations and its cash flows for the year then ended, in accordance with the provisions of its Financial Regulation and the accounting rules adopted by the Commission’s accounting officer (12).

11.

In the Court’s opinion, the transactions underlying the annual accounts of the Agency for the financial year ended 31 December 2011 are legal and regular in all material respects.

12.

The comments which follow do not call the Court’s opinions into question.

13.

The Agency’s total budget amounted to 4,8 million euro, out of which 1,5 million euro (31 %) of appropriations were not committed. The amount was entirely paid back to the Commission. Appropriations amounting to 0,9 million euro (29 % of total appropriations) were carried forward to 2012. The carry-forward was particularly high for Title II (administrative expenditure) with 0,3 million euro (59 % of total Title II appropriations) and Title III (operational expenditure) with 0,4 million euro (59 % of Title III appropriations). The level of payments against commitments was also low with 41 % for Title II and 41 % also for Title III. The high level of appropriations not used and of carry overs as well as the low level of payments indicate shortcomings in budget planning and implementation and are at odds with the budgetary principle of annuality.

14.

There is room to improve the transparency of recruitment procedures. As an example, vacancy notices did not specify the maximum number of candidates to be put on a reserve list and made no reference to the possibility of appeal. Moreover the questions for written tests and interviews and their weightings were not prepared before the examination of the applications.

15.

In 2011 the Agency paid subsistence allowances amounting to 10 839 euro to seconded experts who were nationals of the State where the Agency is situated. This payment conflicts with the Rules on the Secondment of National Experts adopted by the Administrative Board of the Agency, which provide for the granting of such allowances only to temporary agents who are not nationals of the Member State where they are employed; such payments are irregular.