From: Telegraph.co.uk
Taypayers' money spent on showgirls, campaign group claims
British taxpayers' money is being wasted by the European Union on a myriad of "bizarre" schemes, a campaign group has claimed.
Grants include £850,000 for Intertango, a Finnish dance project to further "the internationalisation of Finnish tango" and £1 million to help young Italian women learn a trade as television showgirls in Naples.
A think-tank called Open Europe, which campaigns for more transparency within the EU, included these examples in a list it compiled of the 'Top 100' examples of waste and fraud.
In one case £10 million (12 million Euros) was siphoned away into a secret bank account by authorities in the Belgian city of Charleroi, which spent it on a series of parties and outings including a hunting trip to Belarus.
In another Italian dentist Giovanni Lupo invented a solar panel business to acquire cash from the EU, which he spent on 55 luxury cars include a yellow Ferrari Testarossa. The dentist was part of a larger fraud scheme that drained the EU of more than £60 million (80 million Euros).
British taxpayers contribute almost 10 per cent of the EU's estimated £123 billion budget.
The European Court of Auditors has refused to sign off the EU's books for the last 13 years because of suspected fraud and financial irregularities.
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