EU Presidency candidate Herman Van Rompuy calls for new taxes

www.telegraph.co.uk

Herman Van Rompuy, the man widely expected to be appointed the first President of Europe this week, has called for new eco-taxes and levies on the financial sector to fund a more powerful European Union.

Belgium’s prime minister made the controversial proposal, leaked to a Flemish newspaper, during a secret dinner to promote his candidacy hosted by the elite Bilderberg Group.

The comments have added to a backlash against Mr Van Rompuy who, while still the favourite, has been identified as a federalist who is being championed as part of a Franco-German “stitch up” ahead a summit dinner that will appoint an EU President in Brussels on Thursday.

Mr Van Rompuy told an audience of industrialists and politicians that new European environmental and financial taxes, levied by Brussels, should fund the EU to replace resented national contributions being cut by governments because of the recession.

“The possibilities of financial levies at European level must be seriously examined and for the first time the large countries in the union are open to that,” he said, according to the newspaper De Tijd.

The idea of using VAT, fuel duties and aviation taxes to give the EU a direct and independent source of income has long been demanded by the European Commission. Proposals currently circulating in Brussels could mean that all airline tickets, shopping and petrol station receipts in Britain list the amount of aviation tax, VAT or fuel duty that goes directly to Brussels as an “EU tax”.

Federalist politicians support the plan as a way of giving Brussels autonomy from national treasuries, who begrudge EU contributions, and to provide the Commission with its “own resources” to further expand European integration.

But any plans to give the EU any direct claim or power over national taxation, including VAT, are opposed by Britain, Denmark and other more traditionally Eurosceptic countries.

“This speech is not going to do him any favours at all,” said a European diplomat.

Mr Van Rompuy attended the Bilderberg dinner last Thursday at the invitation of the Vicomte Davignon, a former European Commission vice-president and a leading EU federalist.

The setting was the highly symbolic Castle of the Valley of the Duchess, or Chateau de Val-Duchesse, where the EU’s founding Treaty of Rome was negotiated in 1957 and later the venue for the first ever European Commission meeting.

Among the diners was Henry Kissinger, the former US State Secretary and Nobel Prize winner who started the debate that led to the creation of an EU President after he famously asked: “Who do I call if I want to call Europe?”

Mr Van Rompuy eclipsed Tony Blair at an EU summit two weeks ago, with French and German support, to become the hotly tipped favourite to become EU President, a post created by the Lisbon Treaty. Read more…

Related posts:

1. War in the EU as Herman Van Rompuy makes ‘power grab’ Open warfare has broken out at the top of...
2. Van Rompuy wants the EU to run on CO2 www.telegraph.co.uk Carbon taxes will provide the EU with its...
3. Herman Van Rompuy Using Financial Crisis In Europe To Power Grab EU President’s secret bid for economic power By Sean...
4. New EU President Rompuy announces 2009 as “first year of global governance” Daniel Taylor Old-Thinker News The new EU President, Herman...
5. EU paving the way for ‘European empire’ www.presstv.ir European Union leaders have cleared a major obstacle...
6. Future EU president attends Bilderberg dinner Wim Craeye Prisonplanet Sunday, Nov 15th, 2009 According to...
7. EU to name first permanent president on 19 November euobserver.com EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS – The Swedish presidency has...
8. Diplomats say EU choose Belgian as new president www.ajc.com (Photo: Herman Van Rompuy) BRUSSELS — Diplomats say...
9. IMF offers to help Greece; EU disappoints markets MUMBAI (Reuters) – The International Monetary Fund on Friday...
10. EUROFACTS … 30 November 2009 Anthony Coughlan www.nationalplatform.org LISBON TREATY COMES INTO FORCE TOMORROW,...