Financial Assistance Mechanisms: €110 billion potential EU budget liabilities should be effectively controlled and monitored

"These instruments are vital for some Member States and the intervention of the European Union was mandatory to save the Eurozone", said Rapporteur Iliana Ivanova MEP at a Hearing organised by the Committee on Budgetary Control of the European Parliament. The Hearing, 'Budgetary Control of the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF), the European Financial Stabilisation Mechanism (EFSM) and the European Stability Mechanism (ESM)', focused on these different financial assistance mechanisms.

According to Ms Ivanova, the establishment and use of these instruments is urgent and necessary, but one should not forget that two of these instruments - the EFSM and the Balance of Payments facility (BoP) - represent up to €110 billion of potential liabilities for the EU budget. "This amount has not been questioned so far", stressed the Bulgarian MEP. Moreover, this sum represents almost all the 2012 EU budget payments. "We, as policy-makers, should ensure that appropriate control systems are in place. We should check how efficiently and effectively the money is spent. We owe it to the European taxpayer", added Ms Ivanova.

She welcomed the European Court of Auditors' intention to perform a preliminary study in its 2012 audit programme on the BoP assistance. The Bulgarian MEP continued: "I hope that this study will be a first step and that further analyses of the other instruments for financial assistance will follow."

MEPs called for a greater role of the European Parliament in the budgetary control process, respecting the provisions laid down in the Treaties. The EU Parliament should play a crucial role in scrutinising the Commission's lending and borrowing operations as regards the EFSM. Furthermore, as far as the ESM is concerned, the European Parliament should be granted the same level of access to information as the national parliaments.