Chopin, Apples, Soccer: Inside EU’s Trillion-Dollar Budget Scrap
Chopin, Apples, Soccer: Inside EU’s Trillion-Dollar Budget Scrap
(Bloomberg) -- For most politicians, a debate on how to raise and spend 1 trillion euros ($1.1 trillion) would be too important to miss. Not for Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte.
“I’ve brought the biography of Frederic Chopin along,” Rutte -- an amateur pianist -- told reporters in Brussels before a meeting with fellow European Union leaders on the bloc’s seven-year budget. “Our stance is well known. I don’t see what I should do there.”
The budget is the first since the U.K. quit the EU, leaving a fiscal hole of at least 60 billion euros ($65 billion). Rutte’s tone underscores the entrenched positions of “frugal” northern states that want to plug the gap by cutting spending and poorer nations that are demanding higher contributions.
Luxembourg Premier Xavier Bettel said the latest budget proposal -- from EU Council President Charles Michel, who chairs the summit -- suggests member-states will have to do more with less.
“I don’t know if Charles Michel is the twin brother of David Copperfield,” he said in a reference to the famous American magician. “I don’t know how this should work.”
Acrimony among the warring factions rules out a a quick-fire deal. Bulgarian Prime Minister Boyko Borisov is already ruing that he’ll miss a Europa League soccer match involving one of his nation’s teams scheduled for Thursday evening.
“We won’t be able to watch Ludogorets-Inter” Milan, he sighed.
The Belgian capital plans to keep access to Schuman square, where the 27 EU leaders are meeting, restricted until Saturday. Some officials in Brussels see proceedings dragging on into Sunday, though an eventual breakdown remains the likeliest outcome.
French President Emmanuel Macron retained hope of a breakthrough, saying the meeting could “take a few hours, a few days,” or even “a few nights.”
Just a few meters down the road, farmers from France, Belgium and the Baltic countries sought to remind their leaders of the importance of the budget negotiations. They drove tractors to the edge of the security barricades holding signs and chanting slogans to protest proposed cuts in agricultural subsidies.
They’ll struggle to find sympathy from everyone. Rutte enjoyed a question about the thrifty nature of the group of nations of which the Netherlands is part.
“We’re frugal as Dutch people -- we love that,” he said. “I have a little apple along, for the night.”
And like many of the assembled leaders, he was skeptical that a deal can be struck during this summit, comparing the process to the jammed-up political situation in Belgium, which has been run by a caretaker cabinet for the last 429 days.
“It’s still more possible to form a government in Belgium than to lead Europe to a budget,” Rutte said.
--With assistance from Viktoria Dendrinou and John Martens.
To contact the reporters on this story: Nikos Chrysoloras in Brussels at nchrysoloras@bloomberg.net;Katharina Rosskopf in Brussels at krosskopf@bloomberg.net;Slav Okov in Sofia at sokov@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Chad Thomas at cthomas16@bloomberg.net, Andrew Langley, Chris Reiter
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