WHEN Matteo Renzi (pictured) won 41% of the Italian vote in the European Parliament election in May, there was an almost audible sigh of relief among pro-Europeans. Here at least, it seemed, was a country where voters remained loyal to the EU project. And what is more, it had a dynamic young leader who could trounce adversaries with a campaign appealing to traditional, pro-European ideals. That was always a grossly simplistic analysis. And on October 23rd the outgoing Commission president, José Manuel Barroso, found out just how wrong it was.

In an act of studied contempt, Mr Renzi’s government published online the Commission’s “strictly confidential” letter demanding an explanation for Italy’s draft 2015 budget. Unveiled on October 15th, the budget reverses the downward trend of Italy’s deficit. Mr Renzi insists it will keep the deficit a whisker below the euro zone limit of 3%. But if his government’s calculations prove to be wrong (and many are based on an optimistic forecast of 0.6% GDP growth next year), Italy could easily overshoot. For the signatory of the letter, the Commission’s vice-president-designate, Jyrki Katainen, a noted champion of austerity, it all went to show that Italy was planning “a significant deviation from the required adjustment path”.

Not even Silvio Berlusconi, who repeatedly flirted with euro-scepticism, gave the European executive quite such a slap in the face as the one Mr Renzi delivered to Mr Katainen, and indirectly to the outgoing Mr Barroso. His explanation, delivered at last week’s European summit in Brussels, turned it into something more like a knee in the groin. Mr Renzi said he wanted greater transparency and would, in future, be publishing not just the Commission’s letters, “but all the financial data on how much is spent in these buildings. It’ll be a lot of fun.”

It is the sort of remark you might expect from a eurosceptic like Nigel Farage rather than the leader of the country that currently occupies the EU’s rotating presidency. Renato Brunetta, the leader of Mr Berlusconi’s party in the Chamber of Deputies, compared the prime minister to “the frog [in Aesop’s fable] who swelled out his chest because he wanted to be bigger than the ox. And we know how that ended.”

Mr Renzi is certainly a man of boundless ambition and virtually limitless self-confidence. But there is every reason to believe there were rational political calculations behind his actions. By dragging the dispute between Italy and the Commission into the light of day, he reduced the likelihood of Italy being given a tougher ride than France, which plans a much bigger deficit (though it also has far less debt). There were signs after the summit that the Italian prime minster may have got what he wanted: a compromise deal whereby Italy would reduce deficit spending by around €3.2 billion.

But there was more to all this than just pre-summit tactical manouevring. Unlike Italy’s previous centre-left leaders, Mr Renzi is genuinely impatient of what Europe has become. He views the Commission in particular as opaque and bureaucratic. And he believes that the most important decisions ought not to be taken in Brussels, but by national leaders like himself.

He is also keenly aware of something most of his counterparts failed to grasp in May: that while Beppe Grillo’s Five Star Movement, a party with a stridently anti-European leader, may have done worse than expected in the European election, it nevertheless took a fifth of the votes. If, from time to time, Mr Renzi is criticised for using the language of euro-scepticism, it will do him no political harm at all.