In February, David Cameron managed to rally of group of likeminded countries to agree a historic cut to the EU’s long-term budget. However, due to the maddening complexities involved in the EU politics, a cut isn’t always a cut (just as an opt-out isn’t always an opt-out). Which is why, while all eyes in Westminster were on the scrap between George Osborne and Ed Balls over the Comprehensive Spending Review, the European Commission’s presentation today of its draft budget for 2014 – the first under the new deal – is politically significant.
For Cameron, there is both good and bad news. The good is that the 2014 budget does indeed represent a cut in spending – from €144.5bn in 2013 down to €135.9bn, a reduction of 5.8 per cent. This is psychologically and politically significant as it shows that things in Europe don’t always have to move in the same direction.
The bad: the cut exits because the 2013 EU budget has been retroactively increased under a procedure known as ‘amending budgets’.
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