2015 discharge: European GNSS Agency (GSA)

The European Parliament decided to grant discharge to the Executive Director of the European GNSS Agency in respect of the implementation of its budget for the financial year 2015.

The vote on the decision on discharge covers the closure of the accounts (in accordance with Annex IV, Article 5 (1) (a) to Parliament’s Rules of Procedure).

Noting that the Court of Auditors has stated that it has obtained reasonable assurances that the Agency’s annual accounts for the financial year 2015 are reliable and that the underlying transactions are legal and regular, Parliament adopted by 501 votes to 104 with 12 abstentions, a resolution containing a series of recommendations, which form an integral part of the decision on discharge and which add to the general recommendations set out in the resolution on performance, financial management and control of EU agencies.

These recommendations may be summarised as follows:

• Agency’s financial statements: Parliament noted that the Union subsidy to the final budget of the European GNSS Agency for the financial year 2015 was EUR 27 606 414, representing an increase of 8.82 % compared to 2014.
• Reliability of the accounts: It noted that, according to the Court’s report, the latest validation of the accounting systems was performed in 2012. Since the last local system validation, there have been no changes to local systems and that the move of the Agency to Prague did not result in any changes in the financial circuits, processes and information flow. It observed that the local systems were presented to the Agency’s new accountant prior to acceptance of its mission. Although it acknowledged that the risk is currently assessed to be low, Parliament stated that the next validation will be carried out in 2020, or, if there are changes to the systems, in 2018.
• Budget and financial management: Parliament noted that the Agency managed a large amount of delegated budget in 2015 following the signature of three new delegation agreements (EGNOS Exploitation, Galileo Exploitation and Horizon 2020) with the Commission in the course of 2014. It observed that an amendment to the Galileo Exploitation delegation agreement was signed in December 2015, assigning a further EUR 300 million to the Agency. A total of EUR 116 067 789 delegated budget was committed in 2015 and EUR 183 108 199 made in payments.

Parliament made a series of observations regarding transfers, commitment and carry-overs, the prevention and management of conflicts of interests, procurement and recruitment procedures and internal audits and controls.

Communication: Parliament noted that the Agency is a main partner in, and the initiator of, the European Space Expo project that visited Luxembourg, Milan, Oslo, Zagreb, Stockholm, Riga, Ljubljana and Athens in 2015, and welcomed hundreds of thousands of local citizens. Each Expo visit was the result of collaboration with many local actors including local industry, municipalities and academia.

It noted that the Agency’s 2015 annual work programme was adopted only in March 2015 and that the adoption of its 2014 to 2020 multi-annual work programme (MAWP) is outstanding. The late adoption of key planning documents puts the achievement of the Agency’s objectives at risk. It acknowledged that, following the development of further versions of the MAWP and in discussion with the Commission, it was finally decided to include the MAWP as part of the single programming document relating to the period 2017 to 2020.