Pay rises all round on EU gravy train: Extra £3,000 a year for MEPs after judges' rul

[Bill Sticker]

Pay rises all round on EU gravy train: Extra £3,000 a year for MEPs after judges' ruling
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...es-ruling.html
By Jason Groves
Last updated at 11:25 PM on 24th November 2010

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Euro-MPs were handed an extraordinary £3,000 pay rise yesterday after EU judges ruled in favour of an inflation-busting increase for tens of thousands of Brussels officials. In a controversial ruling, the European Court of Justice rejected a bid by national governments to cancel a 3.7 per cent wage rise for MEPs and EU bureaucrats.

More than 46,000 officials will now receive the pay rise in full, backdated to July 2009. They will also be paid interest on the overdue sum.

What austerity drive? More than 46,000 officials will now receive the 3.7 per cent pay rise in full, backdated to July 2009. They will also be paid interest on the overdue sum

The decision, which will directly benefit the judges who handed down the ruling, prompted outrage last night. Tory MP Douglas Carswell said: ‘Yet again we see self-serving Eurocrats handing large amounts of our money to other self-serving Eurocrats.

‘At a time when we face real austerity at home, there will be lots of folk who see this as yet another reason why we must leave the European Union.’ Stephen Booth, of the think-tank Open Europe, said: ‘This only goes to show how out of touch Brussels is from reality.

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‘When pay cuts and job losses are the norm across national public sectors – and with Ireland and others on the verge of bankruptcy – EU officials seem to think it is a good time to sue national governments for even more money.’

Yesterday’s ruling followed a bid by national governments to veto last year’s pay award. In the meantime, officials were awarded just half their promised pay rise. Ministers from several EU states, including Britain, argued the rise was unjustifiable at a time when millions of ordinary workers were facing pay freezes and cuts. But the move was struck out by judges in Luxembourg yesterday.

Although EU rules allow for pay adjustments in cases of ‘sudden and serious deterioration in the economic and social situation’, judges ruled that this did not apply. European Court judges stand to gain a pay increase of almost £8,000 as a result of the 3.7 per cent rise, taking their salary to almost £220,000.
Lucrative job: EU president Herman Van Rompuy will pocket a rise of almost £12,000

MEPs will see their salaries rise from £81,401 to £84,412. They already earn significantly more than a Westminster MP’s salary of £65,738 and also qualify for lavish expenses and pensions.

EU president Herman Van Rompuy will pocket a rise of almost £12,000 on his £320,000 salary, which is already twice that paid to David Cameron. Labour quango queen Baroness Ashton – controversially appointed as the EU’s first foreign minister last year – will see her pay rocket by more than £11,000 to almost £325,000. Most of the officials affected already benefit from a special European level of income tax which starts at just 8 per cent – less than half the basic rate in the UK.

The European Commission has set aside £64million to fund the pay rise next year, but this does not include provision for backdating and interest. A spokesman for the European Commission, which brought the case, said the body was ‘satisfied’ with the court’s verdict. The European Court of Justice was asked to rule on the case as the arbiter of EU law, which governs the salaries of EU officials.

Critics last night warned that the ruling would intensify public concern about the EU. The European Commission is already facing criticism for tabling a request for a 6 per cent budget increase and is drawing up plans to levy direct taxes to swell its coffers. A spokesman for the TaxPayers’ Alliance said: ‘Interfering EU judges are forcing us to fork out for European officials to get an inflation-busting pay rise.

‘They’re already on decent salaries and benefits – a rise right now is absolutely sickening.’

[Mil]

Is that before or after Ireland went bankrupt?

[Bill Sticker]

Is that before or after Ireland went bankrupt?

Euro-MPs were handed an extraordinary £3,000 pay rise yesterday

The article is dated 24/11/2010 and the vote was the previous day so yes it came after Ireland went bankrupt.

What is being witnessed in Ireland is the next phase of the rolling collapse of the whole Euro currency.

First Greece now Ireland with Portugal then Spain to follow. Italy is now also under observation as is even France which is the latest country to be mentioned. The German people are getting fed up with the queue forming with their begging bowls and they want out too before its too late so the whole thing about bailouts is like rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic.

The only ones who cannot lose are the bond holders who have managed to confuse soverign debt with their own monumental greed leaving taxpayers to bail them out. In Eire they built 3000 new housing developpments which they knew there were neither enough people to buy them let alone affored the astronomical daily rising prices being asked. Now the whole house of cards is collapsing and the people suffering are the ones least responsible for creating the situation in the first place. Meanwhile the bankers builders bond holders and speculators etc who are still paying themselves huge bankers bonuses and like the MEPs higher wages are still cracking open the champagne bottles and toasting their charmed existance.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1332686/Spain-Portugal-Belgium-set-follow-Ireland-debt-crisis-threatens-euro.html

[bararallu]

It really impresses me how far the Germans are willing to subsidize a failed project of this magnitude- at the quite possible expense of their own solvency, if not national stability generally. The EU is in death throws, and it's going out not with a bang of a war but with a whimper of a bank note being [un] signed. I hope Solana and the rest of the Brussels cadre of extortionists get to shine shoes for the rest of their miserable lives.

[Kenneth]

Not wanting to live in an economic colony of zee Germans I'm all up for defaulting and screw the EU and its unelected aristocracy.

[bararallu]

Kenneth for Prime Minister!

[Madeline]

Interestingly, while reading the OP, one can draw a parallel between "Euro-MPs were handed an extraordinary £3,000 pay rise yesterday after EU judges ruled in favour of an inflation-busting increase for tens of thousands of Brussels officials", and the recent 'success stories' of the American Congress, in more way than one.
What's worse, they are accusing each other of being failures.

[Bill Sticker]

Not wanting to live in an economic colony of zee Germans I'm all up for defaulting and screw the EU and its unelected aristocracy.

You could start by signing this campaign petition to get the UK out of the EU altogether!!

** To get involved, please sign our petition below. We will collect all the responses and pass them on to No 10 Downing Street **

http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/web/europecrusade

[Kenneth]

Kenneth for Prime Minister!

Thank you for your vote of confidence. I aim to do next to nothing by way of governance which will be a vast improvment over the previous shower. We offically do not have a Prime Minister btw, we refer to the holder of that office as the Taoiseach. It means clan chieftan or leader ( an apt title considering the tribalistic nature of politics on this here rock ).

[Kenneth]

You could start by signing this campaign petition to get the UK out of the EU altogether!!

Done and done.

[farmboy]

The above pic bears a striking resemblance to one of those 90's panel games that gave an income to washed up actors that had become dinosaurs and no one wanted to give a proper job.
Perhaps the resemblance doesn't just stop at the graphics.

[Bill Sticker]

They are slashing every penny they can from spending programmes but austerity measures that must be just for the peasants
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Voters feel angry, neglected, have traditional views and worry about immigration... so why will no politician speak up for them?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/ar...migration.html

[Mil]

Nice. I want to go to Cancun, though you cannot really swim there.