I felt that more needed to be done to register discontent. I was backing an amendment to cut our EU financial contribution. At a time when the economy is in crisis - our Budgetary contribution to the EU should not be rising.
Although the Government said that they were fighting for a budgetary freeze in future years, my own belief is that the Budget should be cut substantially.
I made this point in the Commons: If all Government Departments are having to make cuts - rather than just freezing existing budgets - why should the EU not have its Budget cut substantially too. It is not good enough to just freeze the EU Budget.
Interestingly, I also asked the Shadow Labour Foreign Minister, during her opening speech, if her Party supported real cuts to the EU Budget. Answer came there none.
Although the amendment I voted for was lost, over forty Conservative MPs supported it. A significant number abstained. The point had been made and the Minister - who was off to Brussels tomorrow to negotiate this - was made aware of the strength of feeling amongst MPs.
I was glad that subsequently the Government adopted an amendment by Euro-sceptic Bill Cash MP, which, I hope should make it harder for Britain's future Budget contributions to continue to rise.
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Well done, Rob, I am so proud of you for standing up the government on this!
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for fighting for the interests of your Harlow constituents and our country against the greedy EU.
Some 90% of us in Harlow totally support you on this.
We cannot afford to pay the billions we are now forced to pay to maintain the luxury life styles of the fat cats on the EU's grotesquely profligate gravy train, so we certainly cannot afford any more.
Your action sharply contrasts with those of Bill Rammell when he was our MP. Mr Rammell never once had the guts or decency to vote against his government when they acted against the interests of Harlow people. But you're made of better stuff and Harlow loves you for it!
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