Taking into account the Regional Aid and other EU contributions to UK socio-economic programmes, what is the real cost to Britain of EU membership?
It is almost impossible to calculate the costs and benefits of UK membership of the EU with any degree of scientific accuracy and certainty. We know the amount we contribute to the EU budget, our membership fee if you like, which was 9.1bn gross and 4.2bn in 2005 (net figure is after expenditure in the UK from the EU budget on things like agriculture, regional spending in Cornwall and research projects) but it does vary from year to year and will rise in the future. When compared with total spending by the UK government of 550bn in 2006-7 it is proportionally small, 0.76%. However it is more difficult to calculate the indirect costs such as the burden of regulation and legislation which we would not bear if we were outside the EU because we cannot be sure UK government would not impose them anyway. Equally it is difficult to calculate the additional costs of being outside the EU such as import duties imposed on our, now sizeable, exports to the EU. Even the so-called Norway option of m
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