Changes from report parliamentary committee draft to report parliamentary committee draft

Removed76. Acknowledges that attracting talent and ensuring a geographically diverse work force are linked to agencies’ individual specificities (e.g. location, infrastructure, schooling, policy area), as well as to external limiting factors (e.g. competition with the private sector, job uncertainty due to short term contracts, low correction coefficients); notes with appreciation from the EUAN’s follow-up report to the discharge for 2021, the actions taken by the EUAN to remedy the lack of attractiveness and improve the representativeness of the agencies’ staff in terms of age, gender and geographical origin;

Removed77. Calls on all the agencies to prioritise permanent staff over external consultants and contractual staff, in order to guarantee high quality working conditions and to prevent knowledge and experience from being lost;

Removed78. Notes a slightly improved gender distribution in 2023 compared to 2022 at the level of senior and middle management, with 64 % men and 36 % women (67 % and 33 %, respectively in 2022) and within the management board members, with 58 % men and 42 % women (60 % and 40 %, respectively in 2022); notes that the gender balance reported for staff overall did not change, with 54 % men and 46 % women (54 % and 46 %, respectively in 2022); calls on the agencies to work towards the furtherimprovement of the gender balance in senior management; especially calls on the following agencies to encourage and support women in applying for management positions as their gender distribution is not balanced: ACER, BEREC Office, Cedefop, ECDC, ECHA, EFSA, EIOPA, EMCDDA, EMSA, ENISA, ERA, eu-LISA, ELA, Europol, EUAA, EUSPA, Frontex; reiterates its calls on the Commission and Member States to observe gender balance when nominating and appointing members of the management or administrative boards; recalls the ambition of the agencies to align with the Commission to reach a gender balance of 50 % at all levels of its management by the end of 2025;

Removed79. Notes that all agencies have put in place measures to improve staff’s well-being at work and work-life balance; notes that the number and impact of such measures varies significantly from one agency to another and that no common framework of reference across agencies appears to exist; calls on the EUAN to coordinate efforts for the development of a common framework of reference in this this regard; notes with satisfaction that a large majority of agencies have put measures for integration of persons with disabilities in place; encourages the Agencies to maintain good practices of inclusion and staff well-being; invites the Agencies to provide relevant and regular trainings to their staff;

Removed80. Underlines that perceived conflict of interest can constitute a reputational risk to the agency, even if it turns out to be unsubstantiated; believes, therefore, while giving due consideration to proportionality, that a risk of perceived conflict of interest should be treated as if it were an actual conflict;

Removed81. Notes that, for 2023, no major cases of conflict of interest were reported by the Court with the exception of Frontex and EMCDDA;

Removed82. Considers that currently, most agencies have robust and comprehensive procedures in place to raise awareness and prevent conflicts of interest, giving the required assurance of the independence of their staff members to stakeholders and the public;

RemovedInternal control

Removed83. Notes with concern the Court’s findings in the area of management and control systems affecting 9 agencies, namely EMA, Europol, EUSPA, Eurofound, EIT, Eurojust ACER, ENISA and EEA;

Removed84. Highlights that in the case of Europol and EIT, two out of three observations resulted in irregular payments in 2023;

Removed85. Recalls that the Court found in 2022 that Europol had irregularly reimbursed VAT through grants to public authorities by considering it eligible cost and that in 2023 reimbursement for this concept totalled EUR 279 900; welcomes Europol's decision to no longer consider VAT as an eligible cost for new operational grants;

Removed86. Notes that in the case of EIT, one of the observations forms the basis for a qualified opinion on the legality and regularity of the payments underlying the accounts which has been described under heading “Overview of the audit results” of this resolution;

Removed87. Is concerned that the Court's second observation on the EIT refers to the agency's move to a multi-annual grant agreement structure, but procedures and guidelines for ex post checks of grant payments have not been updated to account for the implications; notes that EIT is already in the process of updating its ex-post control mechanism to address these implications;

Removed88. Is aware that during the first quarter of 2023, EMA carried out a data migration but did not respect the deadlines for 48 veterinary inspections, resulting in significant invoice delays not reported in the register of exceptions and wrongly booked revenue; notes that this contravenes EMA's financial regulation and reveals a weakness in its management and control systems; takes note of EMA’s aim to improve the process in the context of implementing the New Fee Regulation;

Removed89. Notes that Eurofound made a payment of EUR 38 600, linked to a contract for assessing the quality of survey data, without collecting some key supporting documents relating to the contractual deliverables;

Removed90. Notes that, in 2023, Eurojust observed an increase in non-standard transactions classified as exceptions or non-compliance events, with the number growing from 43 to 71 and the total amount concerned rising from EUR 294 000 to EUR 566 400 compared with 2022; acknowledges the Eurojust response to the observation attributing the majority of the total non-compliance events in 2023 to a single event for a Joint Investigation Team (JIT) grant; takes note that according to Agency, the increase is primarily due to insufficient human resources and internal process inefficiencies that Eurojust has addressed by revising the current procedure for registering and reporting non-compliance events in 2024;

Removed91. Notes that EUSPA's executive director had confirmed an early start to monitoring activities before the signing of a grant agreement, resulting in activities carried out without a budgetary commitment; highlights that this was not reported in the exceptions register or annual activity report, which contravenes the Financial Regulation; notes that EUSPA argue that there was no need to register the early start of activities without a budgetary commitment in the Exceptions Register but they acknowledge that the case was not reported in the annual activity report as required;

Removed92. Takes note of ACER’s appointment of a new accounting officer, who was also the team leader of the budget, finance, and procurement department, in violation of ACER's financial regulation requiring a segregation of duties for authorizing officers and accounting officers; is aware that as from 1 May 2024 a reorganisation took place, and the team leader of the Budget, Finance and Procurement team has been released from her team leadership duties;

Removed93. Notes that in September 2023, ENISA’s Executive Director allowed 15 interim staff to assume roles in the financial circuit without prior approval, contravening regulations; is aware that according to the agency reply, ENISA has been using interim agents and SNEs due to business needs and resource shortages, and will seek to derogate from financial rules if the resource shortage persists;

Removed94. Notes furthermore that ENISA’s Accounting Officer was also appointed as the Internal Control Coordinator, contrary to regulations stipulating segregation of duties; takes note of ENISA’s acknowledgement of the observation, but considers the roles of Internal Control Coordinator and Accounting Officer not necessarily incompatible since the Authorising Officer had not delegated any powers to the Internal Control Coordinator; welcomes that ENISA will clarify the roles and responsibilities of the Internal Control Coordinator in its internal processes;

Removed95. Observes that EEA approved lump-sum grant payments without being able to show how the amount was calculated, posing a risk that it was not commensurate with the services provided; takes note that the EEA considers the written decision on the lump-sum payment to be fully compliant with the relevant clauses of the Financial Regulation; stresses that the Agency will ensure that lump sum amounts are properly determined and documented for cases where costs are declared by one-person company/self-employed partner in the ETCs (European Topic Centres);

Removed96. Takes note that EEA outsourced ex ante financial checks to an external contractor and that the Court found shortcomings in the control arrangements; notes that in response, the EEA acknowledged the Court's observation and will update the procedures for ex-ante checks to ensure that this risk is addressed;

Removed97. Calls on the agencies to diligently implement the Court’s observations and further improve their internal control frameworks;

RemovedCybersecurity, ethics, and transparency

Removed98. Notes that decentralised agencies of the European Union have established various mechanisms to address transparency and lobbying activities in their respective policy fields; underlines, however, that, according to the Court, agencies are not always successful in achieving the satisfactory levels of transparency and value for money in tenders with complex procurement rules and procedures;

Removed99. Emphasises that, for the sake of full clarity and transparency and in line with Court’s observation, agencies that collect own revenue should disclose that same information in an easy-to-understand way in its final annual accounts, consolidated annual activity report and single programming document, since these reports serve different purposes;

Removed100. Recalls that, in 2022 the Ombudsman opened an own-initiative inquiry CASE OI/4/2022/PB to look into how Frontex deals with requests for public access to documents (PAD), the Ombudsman found issues with two practices used by Frontex: deferring the registration of requests to prevent statutory time-limits from starting, and suspending time-limits due to imprecise requests; the Ombudsman considered that this amounts to maladministration and made a recommendation to Frontex that it discontinue the practices; Frontex failed to accept the recommendation, and the Ombudsman closed the inquiry in 2024, confirming her finding of maladministration; recalls that the Parliament in 2022 discharge made a call to the agency to deal with PAD more swiftly and transparently as a matter of priority;

Removed101. Notes, furthermore, that in 2023 Frontex refused to grant public access to a report by its Fundamental Rights Officer concerning a Frontex operation in Albania (case 652/2023/VB), leading to an Ombudsman inquiry; the Ombudsman considered that Frontex should have given access to some parts of the report and Frontex accepted the Ombudsman’s proposal for a solution;

Removed102. Regrets that the application of the Transparency Register to outside contacts is not mandatory for the decentralised agencies; notes, however, that according to the Interinstitutional Agreement of 20 May 2021 between the European Parliament, the Council of the European Union and the European Commission on a mandatory transparency register the agencies have the possibility to use the Transparency Register on a voluntary basis;

Removed103. Highlights that the use of the Transparency Register is promoted and encouraged by the signatories of the Interinstitutional Agreement;

Removed104. Notes that currently only two agencies are requiring outside contacts to register in the Transparency Register, namely eu-LISA and Frontex;

Removed105. Notes that eu-LISA focused on cybersecurity and combating threats in the cyber domain, in particular, making necessary preparations for obligations stemming from the new Union Regulations on information security and cybersecurity; highlights that eu-LISA operates and maintains a security monitoring platform, cybersecurity incident plan, response playbooks, and 24/7 stand-by duty arrangements to ensure timely identification of and response to cyber threats; welcomes the role of eu-LISA in supporting inter-agency cybersecurity exercises in cooperation with the JHA Agencies Network (JHAAN);

RemovedSustainability, environmental impact and social inclusion

Removed106. Notes that overall 11 of the 33 EU agencies (33 %) have already implemented the EU Eco-Management and Audit Scheme (EMAS); takes positive note of the proactive steps being undertaken by several agencies in their pursuit of obtaining EMAS certification in the near future; regrets that some of the agencies with larger budget have not communicated their plans to implement EMAS in the short term;

Removed107. Recalls that the 2022 discharge (horizontal) report pointed to 14 agencies still not having the corporate sustainability plans in place; notes that for the 2023 financial year Court’s report did not provide updated figures on the issue; reiterates the importance of all agencies having the corporate sustainability plans in place;

Removed108. Encourages the Court to update on a regular basis the figures on the corporate sustainable plans situation in the agencies;

Removed109. Notes that in the financial year 2023 the agencies demonstrated a growing commitment to environmental and sustainability goals; notes that the European Environment Agency (EEA) played a pivotal role in monitoring and reporting on climate change and environmental performance across the Union; notes that agencies such as CINEA and EEA spearheaded the implementation of sustainability-related programs, contributing to EU-wide initiatives aimed at reducing carbon footprint and promoting renewable energy;

Removed110. Notes with concern that, despite the general trend of progress, some agencies faced difficulties integrating sustainability into their corporate strategies due to procedural inefficiencies and insufficient resource allocation; stresses therefore the need for a more cohesive and actionable framework to ensure long-term sustainability in agency operations;

RemovedFollow up of previous years’ observations raised by the Court

Removed111. Notes that “observations” in the agencies’ specific annual reports are in fact “not timed recommendations” by the Court; notes that the Court of Auditors annually follows-up on those observations by assessing their status as “open” or “closed”;

Removed112. Notes that out of a total of 115 observations made by the Court corresponding to previous years of the agencies that are part of this resolution, a total of 57 have been closed during 2023, with a total of 53 still open and five partially closed; observes that the number of ongoing observations varies among the agencies, with some having none open observations, as is the case for BEREC, EBA, ECHA, EEA,EMSA, ENISA, EU-OSHA, EUSPA and Eurofound, while the highest number of open observations is for eu-LISA, Frontex , and ELA with eight, seven, and five respectively; requests these agencies to take proactive measures to resolve these open issues;

Removed113. Takes note that six out of the 53 open observations refer to high level of carryovers (ACER, ELA, EFCA, eu-LISA, FRA, Frontex); is especially concerned that in the case of Frontex this observation remains open since 2018;

Removed114. Notes that ERA has an open observation since 2018 regarding the collection of fees and charges for certification tasks, which began in 2019; notes that according to the regulation the specific needs of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) should be considered and ERA is expected to implement effective controls to verify whether applicants qualify as SMEs; calls on the agency to report back to the discharge authority on the current status of this issue and to provide reasons for its continued open status;

Removed115. Notes that EASA has accumulated more than EUR 50 million surplus from industry-financed activities over the years, for which there is no provision in its founding regulation; asks the Commission to propose a solution at legislative level to address this issue;

Removed116. Notes that ACER had been using interim workers performing long-term tasks to make up for a lack of directly employed staff members since 2019; calls on the Commission to provide additional statutorily staff posts;

°

° °

Change 8

Changed117. Instructs its President24. toRefers, forwardfor thisother resolutionobservations, to the agencies subjectits toresolution thisof discharge7 procedure,May the2025 Council,with theobservations Commissionforming andan theintegral Courtpart of Auditors, and todecisions arrangeon fordischarge itsin publicationrespect inof the Official Journalbudget of the European Union (L series).agencies.