2022 discharge: General budget of the EU - European Data Protection Supervisor

PURPOSE: to grant discharge to the European Data Protection Supervisor for the financial year 2022.

NON-LEGISLATIVE ACT: Decision (EU) 2024/2245 of the European Parliament on discharge in respect of the implementation of the general budget of the European Union for the financial year 2022, Section IX – European Data Protection Supervisor.

CONTENT: the European Parliament decided to grant discharge to the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS) in respect of the implementation of the budget of the European Data Protection Supervisor for the financial year 2022.

This decision is in line with the European Parliament's resolution adopted on 11 April 2024 and comprises a series of observations that form an integral part of the discharge decision (please refer to the summary of the opinion of 11 April 2024).

The final adopted budget for the EDPS was EUR 20 266 000 in 2022, which represented an increase of 4.12% compared to 2021. The budget implementation rate was 98 % in 2022, which is higher than the previous year, when the budget implementation rate was 86 %.

Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine created budgetary pressure for the EDPS, including through rising inflation and salary adjustments, strongly increasing energy costs and the cost of goods and services through public procurement and service-level agreements with other institutions. Members welcomed the internal reallocations within budget chapters performed in the course of 2022 in order to optimise the budget implementation.

The EDPS budget for staff missions increased from EUR 41 000 to EUR 251 000, i.e. an increase of 512 %, between 2021 and 2022 following the resumption of travel after the COVID-19 pandemic.

Within this overall budget, the EDPS had a dedicated mission budget for the Supervisor of EUR 33 000 in 2022 compared to EUR 5 000 in 2021, i.e. an increase of 560 %. The increase in inflation and the substantial increase in energy prices in 2022 linked to Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine had an adverse effect on flight tickets and hotel costs, thus leading to an increase in mission costs.

Moreover, as part of the changes implemented in 2022, the EDPS has striven to streamline its internal procedures to deal more rigorously with investigations and to redeploy specialised staff. It has also been called on to review its rules of procedure of ensuring and timely review of complaints by citizens.

Lastly, it is regrettable that the EDPS has still not formally joined the transparency register.