Defra is to be fined a total of £36m for making late payments to farmers under the old IACS scheme.
The UK is one of 14 member states being penalised a total of £194m by the EU Commission in its latest ‘clearance of accounts’ procedure.
The biggest fine is being levied on Spain, which is being charged £41m for late payments of aid for nuts. France is being fined £5.9m for weak controls under the over-30-months slaughter scheme.
"We have been working very hard to ensure the best possible control over farm spending," said EU agriculture commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel. "The clearance procedure is a vital process in ensuring that taxpayers' money is used properly."
An EU Commission spokesman was quick to point out that the fine on the UK was nothing to do with the late delivery of the 2005 single farm payment.
"These fines pre-date the single farm payment," he said. "They relate to failure to meet payment deadlines in 2003 and 2004, plus a very small amount for overshooting financial ceilings in 2004."
NFU chief legal adviser Julie Robinson said it would still be some time before the fine on the UK for late SFP payments is known, though it is likely to be substantially bigger than this latest penalty.
"Only when the RPA has finished paying out all the 2005 SFPs will anyone be able to do a calculation as to what late payment fines will be due," she said.
Meanwhile, a Defra Select Committee report has slammed the organisation’s handling of the SPS. The report calls last year's implementation of the Rural Payments Scheme to farmers a 'catastrophe' and calls for then-Secretary of State Margaret Beckett and senior officials at Defra to account for the lack of payment, and the subsequent fines incurred from Europe.
