Commissie akkoord met Slovenië en Estland over controle structuur- en cohesiefonds (en) - Hoofdinhoud

At the occasion of the Economic and Financial Affairs Council (ECOFIN), the Commissioner responsible for Regional Policy, Danuta Hübner i will sign two "contracts of confidence" , strengthening further the cooperation between the Commission and the control authorities of Estonia and Slovenia in relation to the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the Cohesion Fund.

"Slovenia and Estonia are the first new Member States to sign such contracts with the European Commission. This demonstrates the quality of the audit work carried out by the Slovene and the Estonian authorities. As a consequence, the Commission will focus on the audit strategy and on the review of the work of the national audit and control bodies. This way both the national and Commissions resources will be used in a more efficient way" said Danuta Hübner.

These contracts of confidence confirm the high reliance in the work done by the Slovene audit authoritiy, the Budget Supervision Office (BSO) and by the "Financial Control Department" in Estonia with regard to the control of expenditure declared to the Commission on the programmes by the European Union during the programming period 2000-2006. These programmes run up to the end of 2008.

The Estonian Minister of Finance, Mr Ivari Padar will represent Estonia. The Slovene Miniser of Finance, Mr Andrej Bajuk and the Minister responsible for Local Government and Regional policy, Mr Ivan Äagar, will represent Slovenia.

This event is the conclusion of a process that started in April 2005 with Estonia and in May 2005 with Slovenia, when the audit authorities signed administrative agreements with the European Commission on cooperation on auditing in the field of ERDF and Cohesion Fund. As a result of the successful implementation of these actions, the Commission has reasonable assurance that the financial management and control system comply with the requirements of the Commission Regulations 439/01 and 1386/02 and that the national authorities have drawn up a satisfactory audit strategy covering all audit activity for the whole of the period of implementation.

For 2007-2013, the Commission trusts that the Estonian and Slovenian audit authorities will maintain this positive trend and continue to ensure the legality and regularity of the expenditure. This is all the more important given the significant increase in Structural Funds allocations to these countries.

Note for editors

The Commission has already signed similar contracts for ERDF with Austria, Wales, Denmark and more recently with Portugal. The Commission hopes to sign some further contracts with other Member States in 2008.

This falls within the context of simplification, co-ordination and efficient use of audit resources. This way, the Commission can concentrate on a strategic approach, which is the real added value of the Community participation. The signature of these contracts is in line with the Communication on contracts of confidence (SEC(2004)632/2) adopted by the Commission on 18 May 2004.

In the period 2004-2006, Slovenia received €254.3 million from the Cohesion Fund and €136.5 million from the ERDF. Estonia benefited from €430.5 million from the Cohesion Fund and €232.8 million from the ERDF. For the time being, the contracts of confidence do not cover actions supported by the European Social Fund (ESF).

Further information about European Regional Policy available at: http://ec.europa.eu/regional_policy/index_en.htm