previous spending restraint exercise [ previous restraint exercise ]

refund of previous years' expenditures

However, since the agricultural financial year covers expenditure paid and revenue received and entered in the accounts of the Funds budget by the paying agencies in respect of financial year "N" beginning on 16 October of year "N-1" and ending on 15 October of year "N", the provisions relating to the accreditation and withdrawal of accreditation of paying agencies and coordinating bodies and the Commission's relevant powers, to the financial management of the Funds such as the budget ceiling, the reserve for crises in the agricultural sector, the financial discipline, and to the assignment of revenue should apply as from an earlier date ...[+++] corresponding to the beginning of the financial year 2014 (i.e. 16 October 2013).

The appropriations authorised in the budget for a given year may be used solely to cover expenditure committed and paid in that financial year, and to cover amounts due against commitments from the previous financial year.

The statistical implications of the audit for EDP data are being investigated by Statistics Austria in collaboration with Eurostat, in order to clarify the precise impacts on 2012 and also on preceding years.

13. Welcomes the fact that the financial impact of irregularities, as estimated by the Commission, was 27% lower than in 2007; notes, with regard to the legality and regularity of underlying transactions, that the error rate quoted for the cohesion policy area in the Court of Auditors' 2008 Statement of Assurance (DAS) remains above 5%; is concerned that Italy, Poland, the United Kingdom and Spain reported the largest amount of irregularities; welcomes, at the same time, the good collaboration initiated by some of these Member States with the Commission to resolve these problems and trusts that the other Member States will do likewise; points out that, as highlighted by the Court of Auditors, structural actions are the spending area wit ...[+++]h the most stringent rules and most complex management procedures in the EU budget and that, as noted by the Commission, finding a high number of financial irregularities in one Member State does not necessarily imply a higher number of errors and instances of fraud than in other Member States but may be the result of more thorough and stringent controls; points out, also, that the Court of Auditors' report on implementation of the 2008 Budget does not take into account the 2007-2013 programming period, for which new administration and control systems for spending have been introduced; notes the high incidence of errors linked to ineligible spending and breaches of the rules on public procurement and considers it advisable, therefore, for the Commission to introduce precautionary guidelines for the Member States and local authorities to clarify how these rules are to be applied and to avoid the managing authority replacing expenditure refused by the Commission as ineligible with new expenditure that is also ineligible;