UK has never been more disillusioned with the EU

The British have never been more disillusioned with the European Union, William Hague will warn today as the Government fights a new rise in the Brussels budget.

The Foreign Secretary will use a speech in Berlin to insist that Germany must allow the UK to reclaim powers from Brussels or risk the collapse of the EU.

He will fire the warning shot as Britain and Germany continue to clash over the size of the future EU budget.

David Cameron yesterday vowed to stick to his guns and veto the Budget at a summit next month if it leads to an inflation-busting rise. But German Chancellor Angela Merkel is backing a larger increase in spending and officials acknowledge there will have to be ‘a negotiation’.

Mr Hague will today depict Brussels as ‘a great machine that sucks up decision-making from national parliaments’.

He will tell the leading German foreign policy think tank the Koebler Foundation: ‘This Coalition Government is committed to Britain playing a leading role in the EU.

‘But I must also be frank. Public disillusionment with the EU in Britain is the deepest it has ever been.

‘People feel that in too many ways the EU is something that is done to them, not something over which they have a say.’

Mr Hague will also warn that the last vestiges of support will collapse in the UK unless there is change.

‘People feel that the EU is a one way process,’ he will say. ‘That needs to change. If we cannot show that decision-making can flow back to national parliaments then the system will become democratically unsustainable.’

The timing of Mr Hague’s intervention is critical. The German government was yesterday forced to deny that Mrs Merkel is threatening to abandon an EU summit if Mr Cameron wields the veto over the EU budget.

In December 2010, Mr Cameron signed a letter with Mrs Merkel saying that the EU budget should rise by ‘no more than inflation’. Since then, the European Commission has demanded a trillion euro budget for 2014 to 2020, which would raise British contributions by £10billion over the period.
But while she has changed her position since, Mr Cameron told MPs yesterday that he stands by it.

In a dig at the Germans, he said: ‘Best to set out your position and stick to it, knowing that you have a veto if you need to use it.’

The PM said the case for a real terms freeze has grown over the last year.
‘If anything, the debt situation, the deficit situation, has got worse, so the pressure to deliver a sensible settlement on the budget has increased, so that is why we will be sticking to our guns.

‘I have not put in place tough settlements in Britain in order to go to Brussels and sign up to big increases in European spending. I don’t believe that German voters want that any more than British voters.’

But officials have made it clear that Mr Cameron won’t necessarily veto any above-inflation rise in the budget.
One senior source said: ‘What matters to us is our net contribution. That’s what we’ll be looking at.’

But insiders have made it clear that having vetoed one EU treaty it is ‘entirely possible’ that he will veto the budget.

German officials expressed irritation at the attitude of the British government. ‘There’s certainly a growing feeling among European partners and also in Berlin that Britain is less interested in any new form of cooperation,’ said one official.

‘That’s a pity, because it is an important partner and we need more integration in the EU.’