the net contribution of the UK is increasing because the EU is investing in Central European countries
To which the UK is contributing with the exception of CAP and regional expenditure, the total contribution being capped at €10.5bn over seven years. Not so huge.
Help poorer countries? Daniel Hannan (Conservative MEP):
Britain's EU budget contributions to rise by 60 per cent - Telegraph Blogs
Oh, and don't give me any nonsense about the EU budget being a way to help poorer nations. If Britain has money to give away, there are plenty of people in the Third World who need it more than the lobbyists, contractors and big landowners who are the major beneficiaries of Brussels spending. Incidentally, do you know which country has been the single largest per capita recipient of EU funds since the Treaty of Rome was signed? Luxembourg.
(Funding for EU institutions in Luxembourg, divided by the very small population to produce the per capita, obviously produces a shock figure. This is the kind of cheap shit shot they come up with.)
But yes, of course, it is vet easy to create confusion with multi-year, multi-currency numbers that get adjusted ex-post under complicated rules and can be provided on a gross basis, per capita basis, and compared to the good old pre-Blair / pre-enlargement numbers... In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
Still, there is some benefit to Belgium and Luxembourg from the administrative expenditures (more per euro to Belgium as it extracts quite a bit with its high VAT rates) and it would be nice if there were some agreement on accounting for that.
