Summary : The study assesses the budget discharge procedures in ten EU Member States and one Third Country (Canada), in order to identify good practices to help the European Parliament to enhance its own budget discharge procedure. The focus is on the effectiveness of the national budget discharge procedures, in terms of achieving two objectives, i.e. to ensure sound financial management and to enhance transparency. The study takes the European Parliament’s budget discharge procedure as a point of reference in order to better understand the national parliaments’ procedures. The study findings identify best practices that might contribute to a further enhancement of the European Parliament’s budget discharge procedure in the following areas:  a robust and trust instilling multi-facetted auditing framework;  public transparency and accessibility of the budget;  documentary basis;  fostering accountability in Members of Parliament’s expenses;  building skills;  formalising the discharge procedure.

Authors : Blomeyer & Sanz