What the Lisbon Treaty has done for you
It has created the European External Action Service which by 2013 will have 7000 staff and a budget of £8 billion. The UK contribution will be £1 billion per annum.
This must be an important function as of the 114 senior staff about half will be earning more than our Prime Minister. These are the figures estimated at present but nothing ever comes in under budget nowadays, does it? Well, at least the leader of this new carriage on the Gravy Train is British, ie: Lady Ashton, who, incidentally is now the highest paid female politician in Europe.
Ah yes! What is the role of the EEAS? This is the EU diplomatic department which will be responsible for foreign policy of member states. Now I thought the Foreign and Commonwealth Office performed that task. If not, what do they spend the £2.2 billion a year on that we give them? It certainly doesn't all go to the BBC World Service and you would have to leave a lot of laptops on trains to clock up that much.
Maybe I am missing something here. In the current financial climate why are we creating a duplicate diplomatic service with a budget greater than the FCO? I suppose if we close down the FCO we could save over £1 billion a year by relying on the EEAS to represent us abroad. That must be it!