There has been much talk about this over the recent weeks so what do you think? We are amongst the EU's biggest net contributors so I do not see why we should have to give it up.

You can find more information at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4094652.stm

France and Germany arent exactly poor, why should we pay for their farmers, especially as those two countries combined receive the majority of the CAP and Regional Aid. I dont think the British would mind helping the poorer countries, but believe it or not, Germany and France are NOT poor either. While France and Germany have their "veiled" rebate, the British should keep theirs. If they give up theirs, we should definetly give up ours. Personally we should just leave, although i believe the new constitution only allows that



Noticing your signature Jamie, the CAP is highly unfair for African and South American farmers too! Farmers in Europe going bust can rely on the dole, African farmers face certain death.

If it's part of a bigger review of the EU Budget then I don't see why we shouldn't compromise. Giving it up at the moment would be unfair and we'd be at a disadvantage, but if other countries make some compromises then why shouldn't we also compromise?

It seems like right we're actually trying to help change Europe for the better, and to improve the Budget. I'm personally all for getting things done, and in doing so you normally have to give something away to get something back.

I agree entirely. We should give it up as long as the EU Budget as a whole is reviewed and some of the "wastefulness" is stopped. To be less harsh, tone down the CAP in a major way, and Britain should give up its rebate. Lets see France make a gesture of solidarity also.

Could some possibly add that as an option to the poll?

Agreed

That is what I think as well as there is definitely a great deal of waste and that annoys the heck out of me. The budget does need reviewing.

Hook: I think we should be willing to compromise as well so long as the other big nations do the same. It should be fair.

I have the huge problem with the EU auditors refusing to sign off its accounts for the past 10 years because of widespread evidence of fraud and mismanagement. I want to know why and want this dealt with. Tony Blair is absolutely right to push for a complete overhaul of EU finances.

I agree, that's why I said it in my first post

Bloody Europeans. First they try and get us to lower the number of hours we work per week (allowing them to steal our national contracts). Then they try to make us give up 3bn.

The way I see it, the EU at large is not looking out for UK interests. The UK should, therefore, look after its own...

Which I'd argue is exactly what Tony Blair is doing at the EU right now.

so if the UK lost the rebate they would give more moeny to the EU if France lost there rebate they would give less. Uk Should not uless every other country does too.

France doesn't give a rebate. Only the UK does.

I'm personally in favour of the Mandelson proposal. That we give up the ?400 Million (about £268 million) of the rebate that is paid by the poorest member states. I suspect this is what we will do anyway. Mandelson hasn't done anything since the age of 18 that wasn't choreographed with the Labour Party first.

This will benefit us thus:

1. We get to keep the vast majority of the rebate, and it wouldn't be frozen (It would continue to grow with inflation. France wants to freeze the rebate, so it stays at £3bn while not being effected by inflation, so the rebate is worth less year on year)

2. It would allow us to score Brownie points with 'New Europe'. Britain is the unofficial leader of 'New Europe'. The new EU countries are much more British in point of view than they are French. We argued for their accession, a glorious victory over Chirac at the time. 'New Europe' is already developing, with the UK at its helm, into a fighting coalition prepared to destroy the old Germanic-French partnership. Hurrah.

3. It would piss off Chirac.

In any case it doesn't really matter what will happen over the next few months. This budget won't even come into force until 2007, and by then there will be a new bunch of boys in town. Schroder will likely be gone to be replaced by a woman who is already being hailed as the German equivalent of Thatcher. Chirac will likely be out. (Though replaced by who is difficult to see) Berlusconi will be gone (ditto). And Blair could very well be replaced by Brown (who is quite a bit more Eurosceptic than Blair). Despite what they are saying there is no urgency about this budget, and the EU usually doesn't cooperate until the last minute. This sort of thing happens every few years. Of course it having happened so shortly after two failed referendums on a new constitution for Europe is just putting this under a huge microscope.

It is likely that when this budget is finally sorted out we will have a far more Eurosceptic and as the French would put it 'Anglo-Saxon' Europe.

As for CAP. It needs to be reformed desperately. It needs to be about conservation, and organic foods. Sustainability, preserving the environment and what not. Currently CAP encourages agriculture to produce as much food as humanly possible. Which is never eaten, and which damages African Agriculture (as I mentioned in another topic recently, indirectly killing 6,000 people a day) by keeping prices artifially low. It is time to introduce a CAP which encourages farmers to be one with nature, and go all hippy and what not. Such a CAP would benefit the environment, would benefit Europe, and would benefit Africa, rather than the current CAP which benefits France, Italy, Portugal, Spain, and almost nobody else.

Apparently Chris and I are in agreement for once And Jaime and I too!

What's really shocking me is that I agree with Mandelson. Such a thing would traditionally cause me to scream 'IT BURNS! IT BUURRNNNNSSSS!' but for a EU commissioner he actually came out with a pretty sensible idea.

NO idea who Chirac is but sounds like a good idea if they are a a polatation. :-"

I just have one question, why is france starting trouble with everyone?

Oh he's only the President of France, no one important or anything.
They lost the EU referendum. Chirac desperately wants to demonstrate that France is still the big power in Europe. He feared that when the EU enlarged to 25 nations power would slip out of French hands. Turns out he was right. Yay.

thanks. Heh yeah that is a good idea

CTerry - as I recall, we've had our political differences in the past, but by god, does that sound good. I say, either the UK should pull out of the EU and form an altogether better club with the commonwealth countries (shame about the geography though), or take the helm of the EU.

The Commonwealth isn't really in any position to form a 'better club'. As for taking the helm of the EU I have to give credit to Blair, under him that is actually what appears to be slowly happening.

So the talks failed, but is Chirac talking about himself here?



http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4106250.stm

It was never going to be a succesful conference. EU conferences never are unless they're urgent. This one isn't. The budget doesn't need to be decided for 18 months.

Actually, if you look at the figures Germany gives more than twice the amount that the UK does.

I don't have a problem with the UK dropping the rebate but I don't see why the French should pay so much less into the EU than the UK and Germany do. Most of the money France gets back under the CAP goes into the pockets of large farms anyway, it's not like it's just funding smaller farmers who would struggle to make a living.

I didnt say Germany doesn't give more

What's more worrying is that the Dutch give the most to the EU per head. Why? They're not the richest per head. That honour goes to to Luxembourg.

True, but only after the rebate. It also has a much larger population.

It's also the third largest economy in the world (we're 4th)

I don't want to enter this debate (you're mainly all from UK and me from France so I think none of us are qualified to say anything. You did anyway... ) but I almost chocked when I read that quote.
Tell me Mark ? Do you know the french agricultural industry to pass such STUPID comments ? I don't think so. Let me tell you that most (if not all) french farms depend for their living on the European funds. And those funds are more and more unable to balance the rise of costs (often due to the setting to European standard which require new equipements for instance, ironic isn't it ?) and that leading to bouts of dissatisfaction from farmers now and again, you know the kind that get vegetables spilled across roads and official buildings.
It's such a romantic picture, the little farmer that gets nothing and the great one that wins all, but it's utterly false in the case of the CAP.

How does being from the UK make me not qualified to say anything? As the farming subsidies are funded by the EU and not just France I am fully entitled to my opinion.

I'm not a French farmer so i'm obviously not going to know the ins and outs of how the system works but I have heard numerous media sources and politicians comment on the fact that a large majority of the French CAP subsidies go to a relatively small percentage of farms that tend to be run by large corporate businesses.

What you are saying is you think that as the cost of running farms is rising due to new legislation we should actually be raising the subsidies ever more to cover the cost. How can pumping even more money into farming be justified when we already are producing a surplus? As far as I understand it, we are giving large subsidies to promote farming, producing too much of it, and then routinely having to buy back surplus food (most of which is just destroyed). It's just creating false market and costing a huge amount of money. There are many other businesses that are struggling to make a living in this country because of the increased cost of manufacturing due to EU regulations too but they don't get anything back. They reform or close down.

Well, for my opening sentence, you were not concerned. I talked about you for your position on the CAP. And by "debate", I meant whether the UK should give up its EU rebate and I judge your point of view (as well as mine and those from others. So I won't express it here) to be fundamentaly skewed. As we say, "on ne peut pas être juge et partie" that is you can't be the judge and be involved in the same time.

Now you are mixing two differents cases. EU funds goes to all farms, but it is true that more and more farmers are selling their business to major actors leading to increased funding as their share expand. Fair is fair, all farms are concerned. Little and big alike. And the new legislations were an example of cost raise but it's far from being the sole cause. Another example could be the fall of buying price in the internal market (at least in France), or competition with other countries, etc.

Remember though that the UK doesn't benefit in the same way as France, yet it still has to put up with the same kind of legistlation, and more and more farmers are being put out of business in the UK because of the supermarkets strangling hold on prices. The CAP should MAINLY benefit the newer, poorer countries, not the UK, France and Germany.

The main question is, Wiz, if there is no appetite for a federal Europe (as demonstrated in France and the Netherlands), what does the UK have to gain by paying subsidies to French farmers? Does it somehow have some effect on our economy?

As long as we pay more than we receive, that's exactly what we're doing. We're doing it now, and we'll be doing it far far more without the rebate. The UK simply doesn't have the same degree of farming or the same percentage of disadvantaged regions as other countries in Europe. If paying for these schemes helped us in some way too, that would make sense. Can you think of ways in which it does?

Barn, that's exactly the kind of argument I do not wish to enter as I have already said. Being involved, I am aware that my judgment may be clouded by the fact I'm french.
Since you push me in that way, let me just say that Europe is "take all or naught". Think about that.

I just made my point to break the romantic but false image of the little french farmer being deprived of his fair share of the CAP, nothing more.

But you have a right to have an opinion. The people who decide these decisions do so based on the opininon of their countries, it's how the world works.

Would rather somebody whose not involved, say America decided what happens?

That's easy for a diplomat or civil servant to agree to. It's hard to persuade populations that that's a good deal though, as we have now found out. And don't forget, all we're trying to do is clarify exactly what "all" is.

And, by the way, the fact that you're French means that I do want to talk to you about the future of our shared continent.

The way I see Europe is that it's not only a question of "give and get back your pennies and hope like hell that there will be more during the process". That conception of Europe is false, at last in my eyes. Europe is a biiiiiig and complex system and I know I don't have the knowledge required to grasp fully the extent and implication of Europe. (or the recent treaty by the way) So I rather let our reprensentatives deals with that as it is finally their purpose.

The purpose of our representatives is to represent their people.

I agree that the fine detail of treaties is best left to skilled negotiators, but it's up to the people to decide what direction they want the future of their country to lead in.

Look - without the complexities of informed debate, it is possible to say, point-blank, that France is a country that puts its own national interests far above those of any other country. The French, to generalise, don't really care what happens as long as there is something in it for them...

Kudos to France, that's how the UK should run itself. However, as we have to share the EU with you, that attitude can become a tad annoying, especially when it involves grabbing our money and telling us to reduce our working hours so they can nick our national contracts...

Barn > Agreed, and it's one of the purpose I believe of politcal formations (if it isn't, then politics are just a way to argue with one another) and that's why we elect our reprensentatives. By the way, don't you think the UK rebate is a "fine point" ?


You know what ? We (and the german as far as I know) say exactly the same thing about UK. Keep your trolling for yourself.
Oh, and a little amusing bit of knowledge. Did you know that during meetings of Airbus, when reprensentatives of every NatCo are involved, it's always the english ones that sulk and search to get everything for themselves ? See ? I can drop trolls too when I want.

Wizmaster - I was not trolling. I respect the French people for that attitude - there's nothing wrong with it (apart from the points I outlined). As I said, I wish the English would follow the French peoples' lead in many areas...