Cameron hits hard at EU rules

LONDON - Agence France-Presse

British Prime Minister David Cameron has attacked “pointless” European Union rules and regulations which he said were holding back growth as the 27-nation bloc battled with the eurozone crisis.

Cameron called for “fundamental reform” in Europe as he blasted “out-of-touch” EU institutions.

He used his annual address to the Lord Mayor of London’s banquet late Nov. 14 to lambast talk of “grand plans and utopian visions” and called for an EU with “the flexibility of a network, not the rigidity of a bloc”.

“The sense that the EU is somehow an abstract end in itself, immune from developments in the real world, rather than a means of helping to deliver better living standards for the people of its nations.

Cameron’s comments were given short shrift by Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg, the leader of the pro-Europe Liberal Democrat junior coalition partners. Clegg said yesteirday that only “populists, chauvinists and demagogues” would benefit from a fundamental reform of EU treaties