The EU budget: A way forward

Many of the bitterest arguments in the European Union have been about money. That is partly because the budget is inherently a zero-sum game: more for one country means less for others. But it is also because, although the budget is small (just over 1 per cent of EU GDP, equivalent to 2 per cent of EU-wide public spending), it gives rise to sizeable flows of money in and out of finance ministry coffers. All EU governments need to agree to the Union's 'financial perspectives' (the EU's medium-term frameworks for spending), and budget negotiations have become increasingly fraught in recent decades.