EU: Budget Debate

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Department: HM Treasury

EU: Budget

Lord Davies of Oldham Excerpts
Thursday 28th April 2011

(13 years ago)

Lords Chamber
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Lord Sassoon Portrait Lord Sassoon
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Again, I completely agree. That is precisely why the other two of the three key points made in the joint statement at the February ECOFIN were about greater member state responsibility for items of expenditure and greater transparency. Therefore, I think that we have already identified the three key areas where improvement needs to be made and needs to be made quickly.

Lord Davies of Oldham Portrait Lord Davies of Oldham
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We of course wish the Minister and the Government well in their labours with regard to this issue but we do not underestimate the challenge of the task and are not anticipating early progress. However, there is one set of sums of money relating to Europe in which the nation is greatly interested and on which I am sure the Minister is well briefed and aware of what is involved, and that is the amount of money we are committed to on eurozone bailouts. Will the Minister enlighten the House with those figures?

Lord Sassoon Portrait Lord Sassoon
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My Lords, much as I would like to talk about European bailouts, we talk about them on other occasions and I think that we are straying a bit far from the audit issue on which other noble Lords may want to ask questions.