mr president may i firstly take this opportunity to give credit to commissioner kallas for the real progress which has been made in addressing the issues and reservations expressed by the court of auditors
in my view this outgoing commission has made more positive progress than any preceding commission in recent times and i thank him for his efforts
it is widely accepted that the adoption of accrual-based accounting systems has been a success and that that installation has been responsible for much marked improvement
i also want to acknowledge good progress made with the common agricultural policy and in particular the iac system which has given great benefit as well
however i do have two areas of concern which i must mention
firstly the court of auditors in its annual report makes repeated criticism of the accuracy and reliability of underlying transactions
i agree and in this respect two thousand and seven was no different from previous years
their message is perfectly clear there is still a great deal of work to be done
secondly i want to mention that the court of auditors was critical of the lack of controls in joint managed programmes
this parliament has repeatedly called on the member states to devote far greater urgency to addressing the auditors concerns and in particular we have called on the member states to meet the terms of the two thousand and six interinstitutional agreement
for the sake of fiscal integrity and for public accountability they must now show more resolve and so for those reasons and until we see real progress being made by council in this matter i and my colleagues in the british conservative delegation will vote against discharge of the two thousand and seven general budget
