UK pays £1.8 billion to help Albania and Turkey join the EU

New research by Vote Leave reveals that the UK will be obliged to pay nearly £2 billion by 2020 to encourage Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Turkey to join the EU:

  • The Home Secretary Theresa May has warned against letting Albania, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia and Turkey join the EU, saying that they are ‘countries with poor populations and serious problems with organised crime, corruption, and sometimes even terrorism.’
  • Despite this, it is the Government’s position to support these countries’ membership bids. The UK government has agreed to pay £1.2 billion under the EU’s Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance to these countries between 2014 and 2020, or £169.5 million per year. This is half the annual NHS Cancer Drugs Fund.
  • The EU Commission describes this as an ‘investment in the future of the EU’, which ‘creates incentives for EU future members’.
  • In addition, the UK will pay Turkey a further £640 million as part of the recent EU-Turkey deal designed to facilitate Turkish accession to the EU.
  • Combining commitments under the Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance and obligations to Turkey under the recent deal, the UK’s total payments to candidate countries will be £1.8 billion. The EU as a whole will be paying €17.7 billion to candidate countries to join the EU.

Commenting, Gisela Stuart, Vote Leave Chair, said:

'The NHS is already struggling to cope with a lack of funding and huge demand. Rather than sending money abroad to countries that want to join the EU I believe we should be spending our money on our priorities here in the UK.

'Instead of giving an extra 88 million people - more than our entire population - access to the NHS I believe it would be safer to take back control. We should give our struggling NHS the £350 million we send to the EU every week.'

 

Iain Duncan Smith said:

'The Home Secretary was right to warn that allowing Albania, Serbia and Turkey into the EU could undermine our security. Letting them into Europe's open border policy will make it harder for us to stop criminals and terrorists from these countries coming to the UK.

‘Despite these warnings, the UK Government has agreed to send them a staggering £2 billion of UK taxpayers' money to help them join the EU as quickly as possible. This is a waste of our money and worse - it’s dangerous because it will make us less safe.

'In an uncertain world, it is not sensible to extend our border to Syria and Iraq. We should Vote Leave to take back control over who we let into the UK.'

 

Notes to Editors

 

The UK Government supports EU enlargement, despite warnings by the Home Secretary that it will undermine our security

The UK Government is a strong supporter of the enlargement of the EU. In 2011, the Minister for Europe, David Lidington, ‘set out Britain’s strong commitment to an ambitious agenda for enlargement’ (Speech in Vienna, 15 February 2011, link). In 2012, Mr Lidington said:

‘The UK remains a strong supporter of EU enlargement to all countries of the Western Balkans, Iceland and Turkey… Enlargement is good for the EU and one of the EU’s greatest achievements. The Foreign Secretary visited Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia and Kosovo in October. He set out clearly the UK’s support for each country’s EU future... the UK remains committed to Turkey’s EU membership. We strongly believe that this would contribute to Europe’s prosperity and security’ (Briefing following Council of Ministers, 12 December 2012, link).

The Government is, however, split on this issue. On 25 April 2016, the Home Secretary, Theresa May, said: ‘it is time to question the principle of ever wider expansion.’ She argued that: ‘The states now negotiating to join the EU include Albania, Serbia and Turkey – countries with poor  populations and serious problems with organised crime, corruption, and sometimes even terrorism’ (ConservativeHome, 25 April 2016, link). This directly contradicted the Prime Minister’s policy.

Nonetheless, the UK remains particularly committed to Turkish accession to the EU. The Prime Minister, David Cameron, has said that: ‘In terms of Turkish membership of the EU, I very much support that. That’s a longstanding position of British foreign policy which I support’ (Daily Telegraph, 9 December 2014, link). He has made clear that: ‘We continue to support Turkey’s membership of the European Union; we hope we can make good progress with that over the months and years to come’ (Prime Minister’s Office, 30 July 2012, link).

In 2010, Mr Cameron made a speech in which he stated that:

‘It makes me angry that your progress towards EU membership can be frustrated in the way that it has been. My view is clear: I believe it is just wrong to say that Turkey can guard the camp but not be allowed to sit in the tent. I will remain your strongest possible advocate for EU membership and for greater influence at the top table of European diplomacy. This is something I feel very strongly and very passionately about. Together I want us to pave the road from Ankara to Brussels.… the case for Turkish membership of the European Union is indisputable… a European Union without Turkey is not stronger but weaker, not more secure but less secure, not richer but poorer’ (Prime Minister’s Office, 27 July 2010, link).

The British public will not get a vote on the accession of any these countries to the EU. The European Union Act 2011 allows the Government to ratify EU accession treaties without a referendum (European Union Act 2011, s. 4(4)(c), link). There was no referendum on the accession of Croatia to the EU in 2013 (European Union (Croatian Accession and Irish Protocol) Act 2013, s. 1, link).

 

The EU is giving €17.7 billion to Albania, Turkey and other countries looking to join the EU

In 2014, the EU Council agreed to an Instrument for pre-accession assistance to pay money to potential candidate countries. These include Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iceland, Kosovo, Montenegro, Serbia, Turkey and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (Regulation 2014/231/EU, link). The UK voted against the creation of this instrument in the EU Council, but was outvoted (Council of Ministers, 11 March 2014, link; Council of Ministers, 12 March 2014, link).

Money is paid is to ‘align’ candidate countries’ laws ‘with EU laws and standards’ in order that they can join the EU. The Commission describes it as ‘an investment in the future of the EU’, which ‘creates incentives for EU future members’ (European Commission, 2016, link). The Commission is explicit that the funds are paid to prepare the countries ‘for the rights and obligations that come with EU membership’ (European Commission, 24 February 2016, link).

The total amount to be paid to these countries between 2014 and 2020 is €11.7 billion (Regulation 2014/231/EU, art. 15, link). Using HM Treasury figures for the total proportion of EU revenue accounted for by UK contributions, it is possible to calculate the UK’s total and annual payments into this fund. For consistency, we have used 2014 exchange rates.

Instrument for pre-accession assistance

Budget (2014-2020) (€m)

€11,699

UK share (€m)

€1,471

UK share (£m)

£1,186

UK annual payment (£m)

£169.5

Source: Regulation 2014/231/EU, art. 15, link; HM Treasury, December 2015, link; HMRC, 6 April 2016, link.

The table shows that the UK will pay £1.19 billion to the EU’s pre-accession assistance programme between 2014 and 2020, or £170 million each year. The annual sum is half of the NHS Cancer Drugs Fund (NHS England, 12 January 2015, link). It is also enough:

  • To pay for child benefit for 157,400 children (HM Government, 2016, link).

  • To pay for 27,300 state pensions (HM Government, 2016, link).

  • To more than treble the UK Government’s dedicated Pothole Action Fund (Roads: Repairs and Maintenance: Written question - 25048, 5 February 2016, link).

It is also possible to calculate the sums the UK is paying to each different country, using figures from the European Commission. Using HM Treasury figures for the total proportion of EU revenue accounted for by UK contributions, it is possible to calculate the UK’s total and annual payments to each recipient. For consistency, we have used 2014 exchange rates.

Funding allocations

Country

EU Budget 2014-2020 (€m)

UK payment: 2014-2020 (£m)

UK annual payment (£m)

Albania

€649.4

£65.86

£9.41

Bosnia and Herzegovina

€165.8

£16.81

£2.40

FYROM

€664.2

£67.36

£9.62

Kosovo

€645.5

£65.46

£9.35

Montenegro

€270.5

£27.43

£3.92

Serbia

€1,508.0

£152.93

£21.85

Turkey

€4,453.9

£451.69

£64.53

Multi-country

€2,958.6

£300.05

£42.86

Source: European Commission, 2016, link; HM Treasury, December 2015, link; HMRC, 6 April 2016, link.

In addition, the UK agreed to pay up to an additional £640 million to Turkey as part of the recent EU-Turkey deal. This deal has been struck with the stated aim of ‘re-energis[ing] the accession process’ of Turkey to the EU (European Council, 18 March 2016, link). The UK will pay Turkey £250 million in bilateral assistance and will pay a further £97 million as part of EU payments to Turkey: £347 million in total between 2016 and 2017 (Turkey Refugee Facility: Written statement - HCWS582, 7 March 2016, link; HM Treasury, December 2015, link; HMRC, March 2016, link). A further €3 billion will be provided by the EU by 2018 (European Council, 18 March 2016, link). The UK’s share of this payment will be at least £293 million (HM Treasury, December 2015, link; HMRC, March 2016, link).

Combining commitments under the Instrument for Pre-Accession Assistance and obligations to Turkey under the recent deal, the UK’s total payments to candidate countries will be £1.8 billion. The EU as a whole will be paying over €17.5 billion in total to candidate countries to join the EU.

Total UK payments to Turkey in the period 2014 to 2020 could be as high as £1.09 billion. This is enough to train an additional 2,830 GPs, 13,500 nurses, or 15,500 social workers (PSSRU, 2015, link).

Download our app

Vote Leave App