(Adds government's reply)
The European Commission has praised Malta’s efforts to make the utmost use of EU funds, stating that the country was one of the best performers in the EU when it came to commitment to money to specific projects.
However, it also said that when it came to the actual payments, Malta’s performance was being slightly delayed due to the slower implementation of selected projects on the ground.
The Commission's declarations were made in reply to a Parliamentary question by Labour MEP Edward Scicluna, who asked if the Commission had any concerns relating to the levels of expenditure with regards to EU funds.
In a similar question a few months ago, the EU executive told Prof. Scicluna that “it had no concerns on Malta” and “was convinced that (Malta) was actually going to achieve its agreed spening targets.”
Addressing a Labour press conference this morning, Prof. Scicluna said that while Malta was performing well when it came to committing EU money, he was concerned on the actual level of payments to Malta.
He said that, according to his calculations, Malta still had to use some €642 million of the €855 million it was allocated.
Admitting that he had no information that Malta might be loosing any of its funds, Prof. Scicluna said the government needed to explain why there was this delay in payments.
According to EU rules, payments of EU projects were only made when a project was certified concluded. All Malta’s projects had to be completed by the end of 2015.
Asked whether he had agreed with Labour's claim before Malta became an EU member, that the island would only receive €1.5 million in EU funds, Prof. Scicluna answered that he had not been involved at the time.
In a reply, the government said that requests for payments are sent by Malta on a continuous basis and the amount requested by Malta on the programmes to date stands at 37 per cent with the next request expected to be sent to the Commission by the end of the year.
The bulk of payments for projects were paid at the completion of the projects in line with EU rules.
If one were to take the status of payments of the previous (2004-2006) programme at the same time of implementation (which would be end of 2006), the payment rate paid by the Commission stood at 30 per cent.
Malta improved this rate in the current period with a programme that was 10 times larger than the previous one and which, for the first time, had a number of major projects which were more complex to implement.
The government said that no funds had been lost and none were at risk at this stage, as payments on the programmes could be made until the end of 2015, and could be checked and claimed by Malta even after this date.