IRELAND: Ireland will stand firm against any further changes in the Common Agriculture Policy, Government sources said yesterday.
The Government is preparing a firm defence of the Cap against any attempts at changing it in return for a cut in the United Kingdom's budget rebate.
Senior British diplomats were quoted in yesterday's Financial Times as predicting "significant changes" to the proposed €871 billion EU Budget for the period 2007-2013, agreed by 20 out of 25 member states, including Ireland, at a summit last June.
The June package proposed by the previous Luxembourg presidency was blocked by the UK, Netherlands, Sweden, Spain and Finland. Now the British presidency is expected to propose a revised draft budget prior to the next Summit in Brussels on December 15th-16th.
There is intense speculation that the UK will offer "revisions" in its budget rebate, worth €5.1 billion last year, as part of a package of changes including a reduction in cohesion funds for the EU's poorest regions and further reform of the Cap.
A cutback in cohesion funds would hit two Irish regions, the so-called "BMW" (Border, Midlands and West) and the South and East (mainly Wexford and Waterford), which are currently in transition from "cohesion" status.
Changes in the Cap would have even more serious political implications. Ireland is not opposed to a review clause, allowing for an examination of the structure and purpose of the entire budget in four or five years' time. "We will go along with a review but provided it doesn't take effect until 2013," Government sources said.
The Irish position is that the most recent reform of Cap "made unanimously" by EU heads of government in October 2002 could not be revisited.
"That involved sacrifices from farmers but gave us stability," Government sources said. Ireland does not accept the position that changes in the British rebate should be accompanied by further Cap reform.
In addition Government sources were adamant yesterday that there should be "full and adequate" cohesion funds for the countries who joined the EU last year. "We don't turn our backs on the new countries," sources said. Ireland was determined to ensure the new member states would have the same opportunities as Ireland did.
As for Cap, any cuts in direct payments to farmers would be "very, very difficult for us".
These payments constituted about 70 per cent of farm incomes in Ireland. Reducing these amounts would be "very, very traumatic and political dynamite", Government sources said.
Meanwhile a spokesman for the European Commission said in Brussels that any cuts in the budget should not hit the poorest member states hardest. "It is . . . clear that it is not those most in need which have to bring forward the biggest sacrifices," the spokesman said.
Daniel McLaughlin writes from Budapest: Poland warned Britain yesterday that any attempt to cut planned funding to the European Union's 10 new members would be harmful for the entire bloc.
"All the new members of the European Union have huge development needs," said Grazyna Gesicka, Poland's regional development minister.
"We need investment in our infrastructures, in technical innovations, in education. Cutting such funds to Poland and other new members would be a mistake for the entire EU."
Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz, the new prime minister of Poland who visited London last week, said yesterday that he hoped there was still room for negotiation on the budget.