The European Commission is expected to carry out on-site checks in Malta to make sure that cases of conflict of interest in relation to EU funds are avoided. 

In a statement, the European Parliament's press office said that Malta is among five countries where on-site inspections will be carried out to ensure there is no conflict of interest related to regional funds from the EU.

Malta and Cyprus show significant concentration of funds in the hands of few recipients

Malta is also named, alongside Cyprus, as a country where "significant shortcomings" have been flagged by the Commission. 

"The European Parliament: emphasises that Malta and Cyprus show significant concentration of funds in the hands of few recipients; is concerned that Commission audits have identified significant shortcomings in the management and control systems of both countries; underlines that weak management and control systems do not provide adequate protection of EU funds against conflicts of interests and abuse by oligarchic structures," a text adopted this week reads. 

The text was adopted by 409 votes to 61 and 42 abstentions. 

In it, the European Parliament also points to the “unprecedented magnitude” of oligarchic groups which use government tools or criminal practices to benefit from the EU funds, with members of national governments and holders of political positions as part of the oligarchy in some Member States.

At the same time, the EU’s capacity to stop oligarchs from receiving EU funds is limited, mainly due to highly fragmented reporting, by quoting “hundreds of regional, national and inter-regional reporting systems” that do not always reveal the final beneficiaries of EU agricultural and cohesion funds.

The report also points to problems in public procurement procedures, weak national control systems and lack of adequate protection of EU funds against conflicts of interest in some member states.

“We ask to increase transparency and to stop the flow of EU subsidies, our taxpayer's money, into the hands of oligarchs. In the light of recovery and resilience facility and potential new instruments, it is clear that the issue could not be more important.

"The most important thing is that the Commission must finally start using all tools it has to prevent the misuse of EU funds. For example, it is clear that the rule of law conditionality mechanism must be applied without any delay, if other available tools are not sufficient," rapporteur Petri Sarvamaa said.  

In order to strengthen the protection of the EU’s financial interests, the European Parliament reiterated the urgent call to the Commission to establish an EU-wide interoperable, digital reporting and monitoring system that would reveal the ultimate and aggregated beneficiaries of EU funds and asked to introduce an EU annual ceiling on budget payments to a natural person.