Hollande, Cameron face-to-face at European budget summit

French President François Hollande met British Prime Minister David Cameron in Brussels on Friday as talks on the European Union (EU) budget were deadlocked, French sources said. Cameron is demanding cuts in officials’ pay and conditions, while Hollande wants the UK to give up its rebate.

Reuters/Yves Herman

"I believe that also in this round, we won't be where have to get to, which is a unanimous decision," said German Chancellor Angela Merkel Friday, repeating a gloomy view she had expressed even before arriving at the meeting.

Arriving at a second day of talks on Friday, Cameron declared that there had not been enough progress.

Under pressure from Eurosceptics in his own party and anti-EU right-wingers outside it, Cameron declared, "It isn't a time for tinkering, it isn't about moving money from one part of the budget to another. We need unaffordable spending cut. That's what is happening at home that's what needs to happen here."

While European Council President Herman Van Rompuy has proposed a reduction of 80 billion euros in the 983-billion-euro budget for 2014-2020, Cameron wants another 40 billion slashed, notably from the salaries and pensions of EU employees.

Sweden, the Netherlands, Austria and Finland also want more belt-tightening in Brussels.

Britain and some other countries also had the Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) in their sights, while Hollande considers the eight-billion-euro rise proposed by Van Rompuy inadequate.

French Agriculture Minister Stéphane Le Foll said Friday that he was satisfied with progress that had been made in negotiations over the CAP but that the amount on the table was “insufficient”.

France and Italy are pushing for the end to the rebate that the UK was awarded after hard bargaining by the then-prime minister Margaret Thatcher in 1984. Germany and Sweden also receive similar advantages.

Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte was also due to attend the Hllande-Cameron face-off, the source said.