Call for MEPs' cash fraud probe

BBC says, "The audit looked at how MEPs spent money for employing staff
The EU's anti-fraud office has been urged to investigate the way MEPs spend money given to them to pay their staff.
A secret internal audit is reported to have found that MEPs are not accounting properly for the £100m a year allocated to staff costs. The call for a probe came from Lib Dem MEP Chris Davies who said there had been massive fraud and embezzlement. In one case an unnamed MEP reportedly took money but employed no-one, and another had just one member of staff. I think the allegations within this report from our own auditors should lead to the imprisonment of a number of MEPs Mr Davies is one of a group of MEPs on the European Parliament's Budget Control Committee who were allowed to look at the report under surveillance and without taking notes or copies. "This report is dynamite - and makes the Derek Conway affair at Westminster look like small change," said Mr Davies. "When I looked at this report my first reaction was to laugh at the outrageous extent of the abuses. "Then that feeling turned to anger and the realisation that the police or the anti-fraud people should be looking at this." Mr Davies told the BBC that the document had to be placed in the public domain and legal proceedings should follow. "Let's be quite honest. I think the allegations within this report from our own auditors should lead to the imprisonment of a number of MEPs. I think it's embezzlement and fraud on a massive, massive scale." Franz Bruner, director general of Olaf, the EU's internal anti-fraud squad, said he was launching an inquiry and had demanded to see the audit report by the end of this week. Every MEP is eligible for about £130,000 a year to pay for staff. One MEP who has seen the report said that direct payments had been made to political parties by MEPs, he said. There are apparently many cases of MEPs failing to make social security payments for alleged employees. BBC News Europe correspondent Johnny Dymond said the audit had thrown up some very uncomfortable examples of sloppy administration at best, and fraud at worst. A spokesman for the parliament's president declined to comment on a report which he said was as yet unpublished. The details are due to be discussed by the budget control committee on Tuesday. "

The EUSSR is nother but a stinking gravy train whose accounts remain unaudited for years. You can smell the stink of self-interested corruption for this side of the Channell. BETTER OFF OUT !