Britain’s bill from Brussels rockets to £8.8billion

BRITAIn’S net contribution to the EU budget rose by almost 9 per cent last year, official figures showed yesterday.

Our net contribution to Brussels jumped £700million to £8.8billion – up 8.6 per cent. The figures take account of the £4.1billion the EU spent in the UK last year. Britain’s gross contribution stood at £12.9billion.

Calculation of the UK’s annual contribution is based on a complex formula and varies from year to year. Last year’s net figure is lower than the 2015-6 total of £10.8billion. But Treasury figures forecast it will rise sharply again next year – even though we will have left the EU. The Treasury predicts a net contribution of £10.8billion next year, followed by £12.2billion in 2020.

Eurosceptic Tory MP Andrew Bridgen last night said the figures reinforced the case for leaving the bloc. ‘This is another 700 million reasons why the British people were right to vote to leave the EU,’ he said.

However his claims were at odds with a report from a think-tank which forecast every person in Britain will be at least £800 worse off if we leave the EU without a deal.

The national Institute for Economic and Social Research (nIESR) also said if there was an ‘ultra-soft’ Brexit, where market access to the Continent is virtually unchanged, there would be robust economic growth of 1.4 per cent this year and 1.7 per cent next year. If the slightly more restrictive agreement preferred by Mrs May is approved, nIESR said the country will be £500 poorer per person.

Last night Brexit campaigners said the claims were speculative scaremongering. Jacob Rees-Mogg said: ‘A modicum of humility from these pseudo-experts would be welcome after the woeful inaccuracies of their earlier forecasts.’