UK launches offensive on EU rebate

[CHIMO]

Britain last night launched an all-out offensive to preserve its £3.2bn EU budget rebate when Jack Straw attacked President Jacques Chirac for making "deluded" demands for a British climbdown.

Setting the scene for the worst Anglo-French confrontation since the Iraq war, the foreign secretary bluntly told his EU counterparts that Britain would never give ground until France agreed to give up some of its generous agricultural subsidies.

"The rebate is not the issue, and people are deluded if they think it is the issue," Mr Straw said in remarks clearly aimed at the French president, who last week called on Britain to make a "gesture of solidarity".

Speaking as he arrived for a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Luxembourg, Mr Straw added: "The rebate is a symptom of a fundamentally distorted budget system that continues to give the UK the lowest receipts per capita of any country because our agricultural sector is efficient and relatively small.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/eu/story/0,7369,1505234,00.html

Wonder if the UK is going to be part of the "New New Europe"?