Barroso calls for CAP concessions

EU members should make concessions on the Common Agriculture Policy (CAP) while Britain should do the same on their rebate, Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said in Dublin yesterday.

Negotiations on the EU’s multi-billion budget broke down in Brussels last week because Britain demanded a review of the CAP.

Mr Barroso warned that the union’s budget must be agreed as soon as possible and said he believed the British could get a deal during their six-month presidency, which begins today.

He insisted that the CAP reform and the British rebate worth over €5 billion last year should not be a precondition for agreeing the budget.

Mr Barroso, in Dublin yesterday to address the National Forum on Europe, said there should be a rendezvous clause to review the needs of the union and its budget possibly in 2008.

This ties in with the British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s wish to have a plan drawn up to scrap CAP which would be implemented during the second half of the budget period.