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European Union Bill

My Lords, this amendment is not the correct vehicle to address what desperately needs to be addressed, which is the EU budget. It is completely unaccountable. I recollect that in the other place, for several years in the early 2000s, I had the task of going through the EU budget and debating it in the committee that existed for that purpose. It was extremely frustrating that there was no power to do anything about it. I am sure that this is somewhat out of date, but at that time roughly half of the budget went on the CAP, a quarter went on structural funds—the one area that seemed to be very positive and to have done useful work—and something like a quarter went on all sorts of strange pet projects. I remember discovering that £500 million, I think, had been allocated for the advancement of democracy in Africa, and only some £20 million had actually been identified as to where it had gone. Candidly, I think the EU budget has risen considerably more in the last decade than even out-of-control UK government expenditure. Therefore I am wholly sympathetic to the principle, and the EU budget will need to be properly democratically accountable and reined in. However, I do not feel that this amendment is the right way to address that problem.