The European Court of Auditors disapproves of EU spending for the third consecutive year

• Brands Aida

  publisher Brussels

There are too many mistakes in EU spending. This is the conclusion of the European Court of Auditors in a report on the examination of expenditure. It is estimated that around 3% of EU spending should not have been spent.

This is the third time in a row that the European Court of Auditors has rejected the Commission’s expenditure. According to the regulator, more mistakes are made every year.

For example, after further scrutiny, it emerged that money for unemployed youth in France was also given to people who found a job. The European Commission and France did not ask for proof, but only relied on the statements of the young people themselves.

The Court of Auditors considers it worrying that more and more errors are being made. “It’s a tough judgment,” says Stef Blok, a member of the European Court of Auditors since late July. “I’d be very uncomfortable with that.”

The greater number of errors does not automatically mean that there is more fraud with EU money. The European regulator defines a spending error if the money is not spent according to the rules of the European Parliament and EU countries.

However, fifteen cases of suspected fraud were also found. This is much more than the year before. So six of these cases were found. These cases were referred to the European Anti-Fraud Office.

This year, the expenditure of the Crown Recovery Fund was examined for the first time. This has existed since 2020 and contains 800 billion euros in subsidies and loans, intended for countries to emerge from the crown crisis. Only Spain received money from that fund last year. The Court found no significant errors on the part of the Commission in this case.

However, the Court of Auditors is concerned because, according to Blok, it is currently difficult to determine whether the expenses are eligible. As many more countries will receive large sums from the krona recovery fund next year, “time is running out.” The Court recommends that the Commission impose clearly verifiable conditions on countries. Then the supervisor can check if the money was well spent.

In 2021, the European Union spent 181.5 billion euros, or about 2.4% of all public spending in the 27 EU countries.