EU accused of trying to ‘indoctrinate’ children and trying to influence EU referendum after it emerges it is spending £500million a year promoting itself.
The EU is spending more than £500million a year promoting itself amid growing concern that it could have an “insidious” impact on the result of Britain’s referendum.
The analysis by Business for Britain, the Eurosceptic campaign, found that the EU has produced thousands of publications, videos and information campaigns to promote its values. The spending includes more than 100 publications, over 1,000 videos as well as cartoons, colouring books and other educational materials intended to promote EU values to children.
Matthew Elliott, the chief executive of Business for Britain, said: “With UK taxpayers contributing more and more to the EU Budget, it is staggering that the European Institutions are throwing away our hard-earned money on propaganda promoting the European project. “Indoctrinating children in classrooms and funding EU-friendly NGOs is a completely inappropriate use of taxpayers’ money when budgets are being cut at home. When Parliament debates the EU Referendum Bill in the autumn, it is vital that MPs prevent the EU from using its huge PR budget to brainwash voters and insidiously influence the result.”
The report, which went through European budgets on a line-by-line basis, established that the EU spent £560million directly on promotions and communications. However, the figure is likely to be conservative as many promotional activities are included in larger budgets and not detailed separately. Business for Britain said that the EU committed to £3.1billion worth of spending which included “corporate communication of the political priorities of the Union” – more than the advertising budget for Coca Cola.