2010 discharge: Euratom Supply Agency (ESA)

Having examined the revenue and expenditure account for the financial year 2010 and the balance sheet at 31 December 2010 of the Euratom Supply Agency, as well as the Court of Auditors' report on the annual accounts of the Agency for the financial year 2010, accompanied by the Agency's replies to the Court's observations, the Council recommends the European Parliament to give a discharge to the Director General of the Agency in respect of the implementation of the budget for the financial year 2010.

However, the Council considers that observations made in the Court of Auditor's report call for a certain number of remarks:

• the Council welcomes the Court's opinion that, in all material respects, the Agency's annual accounts fairly present the financial position as at 31 December 2010 and the results of operations and cash flows for the year then ended, in accordance with the provisions of the Agency's Financial Regulation, and that the underlying transactions for that financial year are legal and regular;
• as last year, the Council notes the Court's observation that the Agency has not received a budget since 2008, whereas it should have financial autonomy according to the Treaty Establishing the European Atomic Energy Community, and that the Court asks the Commission and the Agency to take the appropriate measures to regularise this situation;
• it takes note that, in reaction to the Court's observation, the Commission proposed the budgetary authority to allocate, from 2012 on, an appropriate amount on a specific budget line in the Commission's section of the budget.