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Beyond verifying that spending complies with the rules, the auditors are checking that EU-funded policies and programmes in Member States deliver results and achieve more than could be achieved with actions at national level alone.
The activity report gives a comprehensive account of the ECA’s audit reports and publications, checks in Member States and non-EU countries, and its activities with institutional stakeholders – mainly the European Parliament, the Council and national parliaments – in 2018. The auditors also provide key information on their staff, management and finances, applying the same standards of transparency and accountability to themselves as they do to those they audit.
"Our reports provide an impartial assessment of EU policies and programmes," said Klaus-Heiner Lehne, President of the ECA. "As the guardians of citizens' financial interests, we will continue working with our stakeholders to further improve the quality of the financial management of EU funds across Member States and beyond, making sure the Union and its Member States are delivering."
In 2018, the ECA issued a record number of performance (or “value-for-money”) audit reports and reviews. The auditors addressed the challenges the EU is facing in key policy areas such as fighting air pollution, completing EU-wide high-speed rail network, managing the facility for refugees in Turkey and ensuring effective banking supervision in the Union. In addition, they published their highest ever number of opinions on EU law-making – mainly on the new seven-year budget – as well as annual reports on the EU budget, development funds, EU agencies and other bodies such as research joint undertakings.
In 2018, the auditors made more presentations than ever to the European Parliament and the Council of the EU, as well as to national parliaments. The EC and other audited bodies put most of the auditors’ recommendations for improvement into practice. At the same time, recipients of the 2018 audit reports indicate that they considered them to be useful and to have an impact on their work in relation to EU policies and the management of EU-funded programmes.