An investigation last year by Greenpeace found that 16 of the UK's top 100 recipients of EU farm subsidies were individuals or families on the 2016 Sunday Times Rich List, receiving a total of £13.4m.
They included the millionaire inventor Sir James Dyson, whose Beeswax Farming enterprise received almost £1.5m, and Prince Khalid Abdullah Al Saud, the owner of champion racehorse Frankel, who got nearly £407,000 for his Juddmonte Farms. Sandringham Farms, the estate owned by the Queen, received £557,707, while Grosvenor Farms Ltd, which farms the Duke of Westminster’s estate, collected £437,434.
But the European Commission has said in a statement that EU rules allow member states to substantially cut CAP 'basic payments' to large landowners by applying a ceiling. In fact the UK is one of only nine countries to do so -- it applies an upper limit in Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
'The UK government chooses not to apply a ceiling in England,' the commission said, adding that repeated proposals for more radical reform – including a compulsory ceiling on basic payments to large landowners – have 'consistently been watered down by national ministers'.
Brussels sources said Britain played a leading part in a small group of EU members that opposed the measure. As a result, a major 2014 CAP reform package did not include a compulsory upper limit – but left open an optional ceiling that could be applied at national level.
Read more on this story on The Guardian here.
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