What do SAI audits reveal about the legality and regularity of the use of EU grants?

Most expenditure from the EU budget is incurred in the member states. It consists of money the Commission pays directly to businesses and organisations (funds under direct management) and money the Commission disburses via the member states (funds under shared management) The member states are responsible for the use of funds under shared management.

There is no clear insight into compliance with the rules in the member states. The ECA expresses an opinion on the EU as a whole, not on individual member states. An analysis of the reports issued by national SAIs in 2020-2025 produced a mixed picture. Many SAIs had audited the use of EU funds in this period but they did not add to the ECA’s work by systematically checking whether EU funds were spent legally and regularly. Some grants and measures were audited as to their compliance.

The lack of insight per member state is due to the fact that member states are not obliged to account publicly for the use of EU funds. They are required to submit annual summaries of their audit findings to the Commission, but they do not include an overall opinion on the use of EU funds in the member states and are not made public. Until the 2019 financial year, the Netherlands issued a public accounting document, the National Declaration. A number of other member states (Denmark, Sweden and the United Kingdom) prepared similar documents and the EU debated for some time whether they should be made compulsory for all member states.