Keywords
Summary

Keywords

1. Agriculture — Common agricultural policy — Financing by the EAGGF — Finding of irregularities in the application by the national bodies of the procedures for the common organisation of the markets — Power of the Commission to make financial corrections at the stage of clearance of the accounts

(Council Regulation No 1258/1999, Art. 7(3))

2. Agriculture — EAGGF — Clearance of accounts — Procedure — Opportunity for the national authorities to put forward their view during an exchange of correspondence and at a meeting of the EAGGF Committee — Infringement of the rights of the defence — None

3. Agriculture — EAGGF — Clearance of accounts — Refusal to cover expenses arising out of irregularities in the application of the Community legislation — Challenge by the Member State concerned — Burden of proof — Divided between the Commission and the Member State

(Council Regulation No 1258/1999)

Summary

1. The rule that the Commission is not entitled, when managing the common agricultural policy, to commit funds which fail to comply with the rules governing the common organisation of the markets in question is of general application.

Consequently, when the Commission finds that the accounts of national paying agencies include expenditure effected in breach of the Community rules governing the common organisation of the market in question, it has the power to draw all the necessary consequences and thus to make financial corrections to the annual accounts of those paying agencies at the stage of its decision on clearance of the accounts pursuant to Article 7(3) of Regulation No 1258/1999 on the financing of the common agricultural policy.

(see paras 34-35)

2. Respect for the rights of the defence is, in all proceedings initiated against a person which are liable to culminate in a measure adversely affecting that person, a fundamental principle of Community law which must be guaranteed even in the absence of any rules governing the proceedings in question. That principle requires that the addressees of decisions which significantly affect their interests should be placed in a position in which they may effectively make known their views.

The requirements of such a principle are satisfied where the opportunity is given to national authorities to put forward their view of proposed account clearances, both during any exchange of correspondence that may have taken place between those authorities and the Commission and at a meeting of the EAGGF Committee, both of which preceded the adoption of the decision on clearance of the accounts.

(see paras 37-38)

3. In order to prove an infringement of the rules on common organisation of the agricultural markets, and, consequently, to refuse to finance the expenses related thereto, the Commission is required not to demonstrate exhaustively that the checks carried out by the national authorities are inadequate or that the data submitted by them are incorrect, but to adduce evidence of serious and reasonable doubt on its part regarding the checks or data. The reason for this mitigation of the burden of proof on the Commission is that it is the Member State which is best placed to collect and verify the data required for the clearance of EAGGF accounts and consequently it is for that State to adduce the most detailed and comprehensive evidence that its checks or data are accurate and, if appropriate, that the Commission’s statements are incorrect.

The Member State concerned, for its part, cannot refute the Commission’s findings without making its own allegations, in the form of evidence of the existence of a reliable and operational system of checks.

(see paras 53-54)