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European Council

In respect of the first point, it is important that people understand that if we support enlargement, it is absurd to say that we are not prepared to pay our fair share of the costs of enlargement. Over the budget period, the result of giving up a proportion of the rebate—it is only a proportion between 2007 and 2013—is a maximum cost of €10.5 billion. Once the increased budget is taken into account over the next period—this illustrates the absurdity of the suggestion that only Britain is paying—the total cost for France will be in the region of €31 billion. The contribution of Britain will be significantly less than that.