EU shopping list tips from Ben Goldsmith, Bill Cash, Nancy Dell’Olio and Matthew Elliott

Ben Goldsmith, Partner at WHEB Partners and signatory to Business for Britain

In the private sector, every business must provide regular and accurate accounts. Yet when you try to look into the European Union’s income and expenditure there is just obscurity, masking a black hole of inefficiency and waste. The EU’s finances are a mess – the Court of Auditors has refused to sign off the EU’s accounts for eighteen years successively. The costs of EU membership to the UK are high – around £8.9 billion in 2010/11, with the threat of increases to come.  The EU is haemorrhaging cash and making the private sector pay for its financial recklessness, not to mention that of its members; just look at the way Brussels made a grab for the deposits of savers in Cyprus.

The EU needs to get a grip on its spending, as well as making a genuine commitment to transparency. In fact the EU should follow the UK by introducing total spending transparency, allowing the public to scrutinise every pound spent by every department.