Mr. Tony Murphy:

There is an external auditor. Many of these sorts of bodies set up an audit board. It is on a rotational basis. There would be three or four nominees from each member state on a rotational basis. That is the way it works. As I say, we raised concerns about the amount of money being managed outside the traditional structures but how they are being set up is a political decision.

I cannot add anything on simplification. I can only repeat what I said. We always promote it. We are always asking people to use simplified cost options and lump-sum payments. In agriculture and other areas, such as Erasmus grants or whatever else it might be, because they are entitlement-based, there is less room for error. We do have errors. There was a case in Sicily this year in respect of a lemon tree orchard that had no lemon trees. We asked how the Commission did not find out because it uses satellites all the time. There were no lemon trees in that case. That is the type of error we would identify.

As I say, we constantly try to encourage simplification but member states sometimes say these simplification rules make things more complicated. They seem a great idea in theory. In fact, the RRF is probably the best example. It was sold by the Commission as being simple and easy to implement. If you were to ask the authorities here, they would say the administrative burden is unbelievable. Sometimes it does not work out as foreseen. We will continue to strive to encourage it.