Bill Etheridge (EFDD). – Madam President, I have just voted against this measure, as I do against all of the things on the Committee on Regional Development that I sit on – and when it comes here – for a very simple point of principle. The people of the UK pay their taxpayers money; it should be going to the UK.

It should be tax representation to the UK; not being distributed across the EU. I am terribly sorry if there are areas in the EU that are poor. I really am. But it should not be funded through British taxpayers’ money. We have our own issues and our own problems, and not least in the West Midlands where I come from, where people cannot get in to see a doctor; they cannot get into the schools they want; people are being thrown out of council houses, and here we are, with British taxpayers’ money being distributed across the EU. Well, I hope the projects go well for the people in the EU. I would rather you paid for them yourself rather than taking them from the British taxpayer.