According to Tony Blair's proposals, the annual contribution of EU member states to the budget should be reduced from 1.06% to 1.03% of GDP. Thus, the total EU budget will shrink from €871 billion to €846 billion. In addition, the British prime minister advocates reducing the amount of financial aid to new members and poor EU states.
"It was no secret to anyone that the budget proposed by Luxembourg's representatives in June was too inflated," Blair said at a Mediterranean summit in Barcelona. He then assured the new Eastern European EU members that Britain's proposal would be beneficial for them, since their contributions to the EU would also be reduced. Blair's position is also supported by the European Commission, whose representatives deny possible serious consequences of the British prime minister's initiatives for the underdeveloped members of the union.
To the EU newcomers, such statements seem unconvincing. Their experts believe that Tony Blair's initiatives will hit hard the least developed EU states, such as Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, Slovenia, Cyprus, Malta, and the recently acceded Eastern European states – Latvia, Estonia, and Lithuania.
Poland, the largest of the new EU members, is expected to receive about €60 billion from the European budget over the next seven years, and if Blair's proposals are adopted, that amount will be cut by €6 billion. Therefore, Polish politicians actively oppose the proposed cuts. "I am disappointed by Britain's proposal to limit the budgets of new EU members," said one Polish minister. Another Polish official added that "Poland cannot possibly agree to Tony Blair's proposal. If these proposals are put up for discussion in December, there will definitely be no compromise on them."
Contradictions over the budget for 2007-1013 began back at the June sessions of the European Parliament, when Britain refused to increase payments to the common budget until France reduced subsidies for its farmers. The negotiations on the draft future EU budget held on November 25 also ended in failure. Luxembourg, which held the EU presidency before Britain, proposed a budget of €871 billion, which required EU member states to make annual contributions of 1.06% of GDP. The proposal was supported by 22 of the 25 EU members, but the British prime minister and the French president made no concessions. London demanded a smaller budget, while Paris refused to cut agricultural subsidies.
Experts are confident that in proposing to cut the budget, Blair cares above all not about the pan-European budget, but about the British one. Last year, Britain managed to trim its contributions to the common European budget to about €5 billion, and for obvious reasons Blair would not want that amount to rise again.
Still, most analysts tend to believe that the budget contradictions will be resolved. Eastern Europe is a traditional political ally of Britain, and Tony Blair will most likely be forced to give in. Moreover, according to some reports, representatives of the Eastern European states have agreed to forgo part of the payments in order to reach a compromise.
Perhaps the positions of the parties will be agreed upon as early as the end of this week, when the British prime minister plans to hold talks with seven of the ten new EU members during visits to Estonia and Hungary. It should be noted that the negotiators have less than three weeks left to resolve their differences. The budget vote in the European Parliament is scheduled for December 15, 2005.
Stepan SAMSONOV.
Газета.Ru