David Cameron to brief EU leaders on treaty renegotiation plans

UK, June-11 David Cameron is to brief fellow EU leaders on Britain’s proposals for renegotiating its membership terms in the formal setting of the European council in Brussels later this month.

As the prime minister left the door open to an early EU referendum on the same day as other elections next year, British officials confirmed that a slot has been set aside on the summit agenda for Cameron to outline his plans.

A draft of the summit guidelines – the forerunner of the formal summit agenda – simply says that item four on the agenda is, underlined, “UK”. This will give the prime minister a speaking slot but allows him to keep his options open by steering clear of outlining highly detailed demands.

British officials said they welcomed the news that the prime minister had been awarded a formal speaking slot after the summit guidelines were published by the Financial Times. A British official said: “We welcome this. Obviously the prime minister has been talking to leaders one to one and this offers a further opportunity to raise with all 27 [EU leaders] the concerns of British people that we want to address.”

The agreement of Donald Tusk, the president of the European council, to grant the prime minister a speaking slot will come as little surprise. EU leaders agreed at a summit before the election to set aside time to consider the UK’s concerns.

It is understood that the prime minister will outline some of the areas he has identified in recent months. These are a four-year ban on EU migrants claiming in-work benefits; providing greater protections for non-eurozone countries to ensure they cannot be outvoted in the single market by eurozone countries; giving Britain an opt-out from the EU’s historic commitment to create an “ever-closer union” of the peoples of Europe; and giving national parliaments the ability to club together to block EU legislation.

Source: Theguardian.com