𝓤𝓷𝓲𝓽𝓮𝓭 𝓝𝓮𝔀𝓼

British taxpayers’ cash sent to Brussels since Brexit has “vanished into a black hole” with critics warning that it was like “giving money to a drug-addicted junkie”. Former Tory leader Sir Iain Duncan Smith said ministers should stop handing over billions to the EU until there is full transparency over where the money has gone.

He told the Express: “British civil servants and ministers should not hand over any money to Brussels unless there is full accountability and transparency. Otherwise, it would be like giving money to a drug-addicted junkie without knowing how it is being spent. The EU has a notorious reputation for funding unnecessary projects and wasting taxpayers’ money.”

His remarks came after a Daily Mail investigation revealed that ministers had “no idea” what had happened to the majority of the money handed to Brussels after the UK left the European Union.

Only ‘a fraction’ of the money has reportedly been accounted for, following an audit of EU documents which showed that only around 8% of UK contributions had been ringfenced to pay for specific EU schemes.

Mark Francois, chairman of the European Research Group, said: “British taxpayers have a right to know how the payments we made to Brussels to fulfil our legacy EU obligations after leaving the EU have been spent.”

He added: “Labour’s Europhile ministers should be able to access this information via diplomatic channels – and the sooner they come up with the answer, the better.”

The documents reportedly showed Brexit negotiator Maros Sefcovic admitting that the majority of the cash was handed over “without any specific link between a given item of revenue and a given item of expenditure”.

Mr Sefcovic added that the only exceptions to this were Britain’s contributions to the IT systems, as well as pensions.

Speaking at the time the revelations became public, Frank Furedi, director of MCC Brussels, a think tank, told the Mail: “This is nothing short of a scandal. Billions of pounds of taxpayers’ money has vanished into a Brussels black hole, and our own ministers can’t even say where it’s gone.”

Since 2020, the United Kingdom has sent £44 billion to the EU, according to figures released by the Office of National Statistics.

A Treasury spokesman said that the payments “reflect legal obligations from the deal made by the previous government.”