The European Union Charges Britain Another 1.7 Billion For The Joy Of Membership
I suppose we really should have seen this coming as a result of the recent changes in how everyone should calculate the national GDP. For contributions to the European Union are determined by the size of the various respective GDPs. Thus, a change in the method of calculating GDP is likely to lead to a change in the various contributions that must be made.
David Cameron is fighting to stop Britain being forced to pay an extra 1.7billion to the European Union due to the success of the British economy.
The Prime Minister was ambushed with a demand from the European Commission for the extra cash because Britains economy has performed better than other economies in Europe since 1995.
The bill is due on 1 December and Mr Cameron is particularly enraged because Brussels accountants are also preparing to give France back 790million as its economy performed less well than Britains.
I think we can safely say that thats Rochester and Strood won by UKIP there then at the coming byelection. Almost as if thats what the EU desired to happen.
As the Guardian tells us:
Eurostat arrived at the 2.1bn figure on the basis of new methods of calculating member states GNI since 1995, taking account of previously unreported or under-reported black economy elements, such as drug dealing and consumption or the sex industry.
Eurostat concluded that the UK economy has been doing much better than previously assumed since 1995, relative to other European countries, and that British contributions needed to be upped.
It changes the way contributions to the budget are calculated, said Fiorilli. Some member states have booming economies. Everyone can see the UK is growing much faster than others.
Fiorilli said that the commission and Eurostat use 1995 as the benchmark year for calculating the impact of GNI figures. Member states including Britain insisted on this. It is their decision, he said.
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The European Union Charges Britain Another 1.7 Billion For The Joy Of Membership