This multiannual financial framework MFF 2028-2035 must be adopted this year. The Court of Auditors does not make political or binding statements but provides weighty and expert advice on the way accounting and financial management within the EU is structured.
Most notably, the experts express great doubt about the proposal from the EU Commissioners to no longer actually pay out or deduct surpluses or deficits in the EU countries in monetary amounts.
Settling Accounts
Instead, Brussels wants to hold EU countries accountable to agreed 'targets' and 'performance agreements'. According to the Court of Auditors, this means there will no longer be a check on whether the 'policy objectives of EU policy' are actually achieved. This is the same method applied in settling accounts of the so-called Corona funds.
Promotion
Furthermore, the Court of Auditors points out that many EU countries do not put much effort into correcting or settling accounts afterwards if it appears that previously agreed tasks are not carried out. For example, 650 million euros of the Corona funds were either not spent or spent incorrectly.
Cutbacks
The European Commission wants to spend many billions more in the coming years on Defense and Reindustrialization, and to finance this it is cutting hundreds of millions of euros from Cohesion Policy, Regionalization, and the Common Agricultural Policy.
European agricultural organizations see support in the comments and recommendations of the Court of Auditors for their claim that the merger of subsidy funds must not proceed, and that there should be no cuts to Agriculture.
Still to be Adjusted
Others, on the other hand, say it is logical that the Court of Auditors mainly focuses on legal and administrative pitfalls and possible shortcomings, and that the European Commission can still propose adjustments and improvements to the EU countries and EU politicians in the coming year.