Report from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council on the quality of fiscal data reported by Member States in 2011

Article 8(3) of Council Regulation (EC) No 479/2009 (amended by Regulation (EC) No 679/2010) on the application of the Protocol on the excessive deficit procedure annexed to the Treaty establishing the European Community requires the Commission (Eurostat) to report regularly to the European Parliament and to the Council on the quality of the actual data reported by Member States.

This annual report provides an overall assessment of compliance with accounting rules, completeness, reliability, timeliness and consistency of the data. The previous report (on the 2010 notifications) was adopted by the Commission on 11 April 2011.

Eurostat regularly assesses the quality of the actual data reported by Member States and of the underlying general government sector accounts compiled in accordance with Council Regulation (EC) No 2223/96 of 25 June 1996 on the European system of national and regional accounts in the Community (ESA95). The assessment is mainly based on data regarding the general government's budget execution and general government assets and liabilities.

This work concentrates on the factors that explain the general government deficit/surplus and the change in the general government debt. Member States send this information to Eurostat twice per year. This also includes supplementary information such as the "Questionnaire relating to the EDP notification tables" and bilateral clarifications by Member States. Eurostat also undertakes regular EDP dialogue visits in each Member State to maintain a continuous dialogue with Member States.

This report is based on the main findings and results of the EDP reporting in 2011, focusing on the latest (October 2011) reporting exercise. Where appropriate, comparisons are made with the April 2011 reporting, as well as with the 2010 reporting.

EUR-Lex: COM(2012)170: Follow the progress of this document through the decision-making procedure http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/HIS/?uri=COM:2012:170:FIN

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