General Chat

There is of course for the lovers of conspiracy theories, the coincidence of the timing of this demand. News of the demand hit the headlines at a time, when the Prime Minister David Cameron, is being crucified by his Euroscepticism MP's, is campaigning to stop UKIP winning the Rochester & Strood by-election, and at a time when UKIP is making gains in the polls.

Suddenly a demand for £1.7billion comes out of nowhere, and a surprised Prime Minister and Chancellor, scream foul play - and make it clear they won't be paying this demand, then they attend meetings with their counterparts in the EU and some up with a face saving compromise.

Having managed to get this, they then get on their soapboxes to announce, to the British public, that by being tough with the bureaucrats in Brussels, they proved what strong leaders they are when it comes to dealing with the EU - declaring that by standing up to the bureaucrats in the EU, they had halved the bill, delayed the bill, will pay no interest on the bill, and that this was a good result for Britain.

I have to admit I do like a good conspiracy theory ;-)

Well he has certainly got the payment date put off until after May 2015 which is what he is most interested in. Gorgeous George has managed this with the connivance of the French ( the main beneficiary of the payment). Holland is trying to massage his 2015-6 budget to show an deficit improvement when nothing of the sort seems likely. The UK payment would not help France much for this current tax year but will be helpful 2015/6.

Wolfgang Schäuble is seething.

fwiw the UK never actually gets the famous rebate it is always just knocked off the overall bill usually after a lot of argy bargy with the Brits losing out one way or the other. This time G.O. has got something knocked off for real. Despite the brickbats he should be pleased.

The whole way in which the EU budget and payments is worked out is an utter mess as well as irredeemably and criminally corrupt. Much of this happened with a laxist approach from the UK while Tony Blair was in power. Somebody def. needs to get their handbag out.

50% of nothing + 50% of nothing = 50% of nothing ;-)

Perhaps George Osborne thinks £850M is nothing :-S

50% + 50% = 50% - hmm have I got that right :-S

The Chancellor has regularly been praised by the PM as to the eloquence of his speech when analysing failures.

But how boringly inefficient is the poor fellow with such a complicated set of figures. A sad sight.

The Chancellor George Osborne is proclaiming, under the deal agreed yesterday at a meeting with EU Finance Ministers, that he has halved the £1.7billion that the EU demanded from the UK and that we will only pay £850million - now that is one of the best examples of "Creative Accounting" I have ever come across ;-)

It is being reported that the UK will pay £850million in two instalments, one in July 2015 and one in September 2015. The outstanding £850 million will be paid from the UK's annual rebate for 2016.

So let me get this right, I owe someone a £100, I meet them and give them £50 from my pay packet and tell them I will give them the other £50 from my next pay packet - by paying it back that way I have got away with only paying half of what I owed :-S

Personally, I think the Chancellor has not only embellishing the truth, he has also treated the electorate as idiots, by thinking they will fall for his cunning devious scheme - these days the only statements that George Osborne makes that I believe, are those he makes about cutting welfare benefits.