Calabria regional operational programme (ROP) 2014-2020: spending targets and automatic decommitment

Subject: Calabria regional operational programme (ROP) 2014-2020: spending targets and automatic decommitment

31 December 2018 was the deadline for meeting the mid-term expenditure target for the operational programmes financed by the ESI Funds. As indicated in the answers to written questions P- 003303/2018 and P-006058-18, the amount to be certified under the ROP for Calabria is EUR 446 million. In order to achieve that target, according to the Commission’s very recent reply of 19 December, the managing authority still had to certify EUR 122 million. In a press release of 30 December1, the Calabria Region declared it had met its spending targets. However, no updated statistics concerning certified expenditure can be found on the regional portal2. Meanwhile, according to the Commission website3, the payments (updated on a daily basis) for the Calabria ROP still amount to EUR 234 million.

Bearing in mind that EU funds are shares of the EU budget, based on national taxes and contributions, and that their use must be transparent and properly reported to the public, can the Commission say:

1) whether, by the deadline of 31 December 2018, the 2014-2020 ROP for Calabria had achieved its spending target of EUR 446 million, thus avoiding the ‘automatic decommitment’ procedure;

2) whether, in the light of the ‘Lande Desolate’ investigation and the modus operandi of numerous regional officials, it does not think it is worth scrutinising, through OLAF, the high level of expenditure certified in the last 10 days of December;

3) what the reasons were for the failure of the monitoring committee to meet in December 2018, as scheduled?

1 http://www.regione.calabria.it/website/portaltemplates/view/view.cfm?12129

2 http://calabriaeuropa.regione.calabria.it/website

3 https://cohesiondata.ec.europa.eu/

Answer given by Ms Creţu on behalf of the European Commission

(5 February 2019)

The Commission confirms that by the deadline of 31 December 2018, the 2014-2020 regional programme for Calabria had achieved its European Regional Development Fund (ERDF)/ European Social Fund (ESF) spending target of EUR 446 million, thus avoiding the ‘automatic decommitment’ procedure. The total amount of ERDF/ESF payments, as of 31 December 2018, equals EUR 489 million which therefore exceeds the 2018’s end of year target by EUR 43 million. The ‘Lande Desolate’ investigation concerned projects falling under the 2007-2013 ERDF operational programme. According to information received by the Commission, the programmes' authorities have already reported to the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) the alleged irregularities concerning those projects. As regards the 2014-2020 ERDF/ESF programme, the Commission has no evidence, at present, of irregularities linked to the ongoing investigation ‘Lande Desolate’ to be reported to OLAF. However, in the light of that investigation, the Commission will ask the newly appointed programmes' authorities to carry out additional verifications on the correctness of the expenditure certified so far. The monitoring Committee which was indicatively scheduled in December 2018 has been postponed due to increased workload at the end of the year. The newly appointed managing authority will soon fix a date for the next monitoring committee.

⋅1∙ http://www.regione.calabria.it/website/portaltemplates/view/view.cfm?12129

⋅2∙ http://calabriaeuropa.regione.calabria.it/website

⋅3∙ https://cohesiondata.ec.europa.eu/