2009 discharge: European Police College CEPOL

Following the postponement of the discharge decision in May 2011, the European Parliament adopted by 519 votes to 67, with 52 abstentions, a decision on granting discharge to the Director of the European Police College on the implementation of College's budget for financial year 2008. The decision to grant the discharge shall also constitute the closure of CEPOL’s accounts.

Furthermore, Parliament adopted a resolution with observations which are an integral part of the decision to grant discharge. These may be summarised as follows:

General assessment: Parliament acknowledges measures taken by the new management and governance of the College to tackle its deficiencies in response to Parliament's request for action, following the serious irregularities in the implementation of the budget for 2009 and welcome, in particular, the following actions taken in time to respond to Parliament's requests: (i)  the revision of the Financial Regulation of the College by introducing a derogation concerning the exclusion for tender with regard to the selection of educational experts in order to use experts from national police training institutes and, therefore, ensuring the cost effectiveness and the representation of these institutions as part of the College's network; (ii) the assurance from the Court of Auditors and from the IAS that the College's MAP for 2010-2014 gives an overview of the status of its different milestones and that the College is progressing according to its targets; (iii) a report on the application by the College of the procurement manual for the period covering 1 July 2010 - 1 July 2011; (iv) the decision of the Governing Board of the College to grant voting rights to the Commission.

Parliament looks forward to the Commission's presentation in 2012 of the College's new legal framework to integrate the abovementioned Commission's voting rights in the proceedings of the Governing Board. It notes that the final report on the five-year external evaluation of the College established that there is a case for the College's relocation and calls on the Court of Auditors to prepare a special report, during 2012, setting out the costs and benefits in financial and operational terms of merging the College's responsibilities with those of Europol.

Specific observations: Parliament also makes a series of more technical observations in the following areas:

• improving the procurement procedure;
• strengthen technical elements to avoid carry-overs;
• improving financial discipline and internal control of the College;
• better management of human resources;
• improvement of the legality of certain expenses.

The College's MAP for 2010-2014: Parliament notes that the enhanced transparency provided by the current Director and its management team has led to an improved understanding of the challenges the College is facing and has fostered the necessary changes. It welcomes, in this respect, the policy of the College to publish a monthly newsletter and regular progress reports on its activities for its Governing Board in order to provide them with a clearer analysis of the status of the College's activities. In addition, it calls on the College to consult Parliament regularly and to continue to update it with its progress report on the MAP implementation.