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...remember to say you saw it in the SOL TIMES
SOLTIMES JUNE 2011
European Parliament refuses to release MEP secret internal audits
Air passenger data deal ‘illegal’, EU lawyers say
The European Parliament is still refusing to release secret internal audits on how MEPs spend expenses that are worth more than £300,000 each a year despite an EU court ruling that it is in the public interest Senior MEPs on the parliament’s administrative “bureau” on Wednesday night published a previously classified report from 2006 finding widespread abuse of allowances. Following the ruling that there is “overriding public interest in disclosure” two weeks ago, the audit was released more than three years after being written by Robert Galvin, the parliament’s chief internal auditor. Its existence was first disclosed by The Daily Telegraph in February 2008 which exposed findings that many MEPs were abusing staffing allowances, currently worth more than £227,000 a year, for personal gain. Following an investigation by this newspaper, Den Dover, a former Tory MEP, was forced to resign after being asked to pay back over £345,000 in “misused” staffing expenses. But in spite of the June 7 ruling, parliament’s officials have continued to deny access to other annual reports by its internal auditor on the grounds that publication does not “increase transparency of EU legislative decision-making”. “Internal audit reports are administrative documents for internal use and not part of the legislative process,” said a spokesman. Reports on administrative internal
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audits within the European Commission are published on an annual basis. Information requests by The Daily Telegraph have established that copies of the parliament’s “internal auditors’ annual report” are so secret that they do not even officially exist on the parliament’s online register of documents. “Reports are not automatically listed [as they] are administrative documents and thus are not referenced separately in the electronic register,” said the spokesman. Even MEPs, outside the “bureau” of 20 senior European deputies, are not allowed to see the reports, even though the audits examine the spending of their own parliament. Chris Davies, a Liberal Democrat MEP for the North West, has campaigned against corruption surrounding the expenses and for the internal audits to be published “I regularly put down motions saying that MEPs, and the public should at least be able to see the internal audits. They are always voted down,” he said. “I simply want the European Parliament to apply to itself the same standards of transparency that it routinely demands from other public bodies.” Following the leaked 2008 Galvin report, the parliament moved to close the loopholes that allowed
MEPs to employ relatives or channel staffing allowances through family firms unrelated to their parliamentary work. However more recent internal audits have not been published making it impossible for the public, or even MEPs themselves, to assess whether the reformed system is working or not. Moreover MEPs are automatically given £90,876 a year in “daily subsistence” and in “general expenditure” expenses without having to provide any receipts or proof of expenditure. Ciaran Toland, an Irish lawyer who took the parliament to court because it “should never be afraid to discuss its finances in front of the citizens who elect it” is demanding that all audits are published. “By publishing the Galvin report they will concede the principle of publishing all internal audits and that should be the outcome,” he said. “The ruling was a positive development and we should be holding the parliament to it.” During the court case, parliament’s lawyers argued that publication of the audits “could be used to derail” decision-making in the EU assembly. “The use members make of the allowances available to them is a sensitive matter followed with great interest by the media,” said a legal submission.
A joint US-EU deal to allow the Americans to store personal information on transatlantic air passengers for 15 years is illegal, according to the European Commission’s own lawyers. A confidential report, leaked to a British newspaper, shows the legal opinion that the deal is “not compatible with fundamental rights”. Under the agreement, officials from the US Department of Homeland Security would have access to the personal data, including credit card details, of British passengers flying into America. The deal was formed to combat terrorism and serious or organised crime however the EC’s legal service noted that it could be invoked for any offence punishable by maximum jail terms of over 12 months. They said such a “low maximum penalty” meant a disproportionate number of people could be affected by the deal. The lawyers also noted other flaws in the agreement, which was dated May 16, including: that it could be applied to “border security”, and could therefore creep into use in investigating minor immigration or customs offences; that the 15-year
data storage period was “far beyond” what was considered appropriate in Europe; that it only allowed redress for people who suffered unfairly subject to US law; and that the only monitoring of the deal would be done by other officials from Homeland Security. The Guardian, which received the leaked report, said details of a meeting of EU ambassadors last week had disclosed that France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and others were critical of the deal, with only Britain, Ireland, Sweden and Estonia in support. The Passenger Name Record agreement will not come into force unless it is accepted by the European Parliament and ministers. Jan Philipp Albrecht, a German MEP, said: “The commission cannot simply continue to stick its fingers in its ears and it is high time that it dropped its obsession with PNR.”
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