Blair accused of 'surrender' over EU budget deal
(AFP)
Updated: 2005-12-02 09:01

British Prime Minister Tony Blair was accused of "surrender" on the stalled European Union budget amid indications his government is set to give up part of the country's rebate to secure a deal.

But even though Blair insisted Wednesday there is no question Britain will give up its entire rebate, officials in London indicated it could forgo some of its rebate cash that would otherwise come from poorer eastern European countries.

Reaction -- both from British politicians and the country's newspapers -- was damning and showed a rare degree of consensus.

The main opposition Conservatives' Europe spokesman Graham Brady told BBC radio: "Of course this is surrender. It is precisely what we were worried was going to happen all along.

"What you have to remember is that the rebate is something that we don't have to give up at all. We have an absolute veto. If Mr Blair is prepared to negotiate seriously and play hardball, he doesn't have to give it up at all."

The conservative Daily Mail -- one of the leading critics of the EU -- led the critics, headlining Friday's front page story "The Great Betrayal" of the rebate won by former Tory prime minister Margaret Thatcher in 1984.

Daily tabloid The Sun -- not noted for its love of the EU -- accused Blair of "waving the white flag" on the rebate.

EU Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso (R) laughs with British Prime Minister Tony Blair (2nd R) while Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko (2nd L) talks with EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana (L) in Kiev December 1, 2005. [Reuters]

Its dispatch began: "Tony Blair last night caved in and started handing back hard-won taxpayers' cash to Brussels."

The left-of-centre Guardian was more circumspect, headlining its report "Blair accused of a sell-out over EU rebate deal".

It assessed the new deal "amounted to an admission that the six-month UK presidency of the European council of ministers will end on January 1 without the breakthrough on reducing EU farm subsidies".

Both the right-of-centre Daily Express and The Financial Times also talked of "surrender", with the FT calculating the new deal could cost British taxpayers an extra one billion pounds (1.47 billion euros, 1.73 billion dollars) a year.

Even one of the most pro-European of newspapers, The Independent, said Blair had "admitted defeat" in his battle to reform farm subsidies, one of the main sticking points in achieving a deal.

It said reducing the value of Britain's annual rebate was a "significant climbdown" but presented the only hope of a deal against France's steadfast refusal to accept changes to farm spending up to 2013.

The Times was more matter-of-fact but said: "The admission that the current budget system is too favourable to Britain is a dramatic U-turn for the Government, which had previously maintained that the rebate remains fully justified by the fact that the UK gets so little from farm subsidies."

The conservative Daily Telegraph stood alone in making no comment on the new proposals, but said Blair had lost former allies in eastern Europe because of the revised plans.