There has been widespread media coverage reporting that the cost of the UK membership of the European Union will rise next year to £6.4bn from £4.1bn in 2009. The UK's net contribution to the EU will rise by almost 60%.
John Redwood MP writes on his blog: "The truth is we cannot afford the large increase in our net contributions, and need to be pressing for a lower gross contribution. It is not just the money we do not get back that should worry us, but some of the money we do get back where the EU decides what we should spend it on. We need to be masters of our own budget, and capable of weeding out cost and needless expenditure where it rests. Quite a lot of those two categories can be found in EU budgets." Read the post here.
