Booklet was distributed to EU leaders as they sat down to dinner at a Brussels summit on Thursday evening

David Cameron seized on an opportunity to voice "immense frustration" at the lavish spending of the Brussels elite after being handed a glossy brochure promoting the European council's soon to be finished €300m (£270m) headquarters.

The brochure was distributed to EU leaders as they sat down to dinner at a Brussels summit on Thursday evening, with Europe facing one of the gravest crises in memory amid predictions of the breakdown of Greece and the potential death of the euro single currency.

Herman Van Rompuy of Belgium, the European council president, opened the dinner by passing round the booklet. A lavish, eco-friendly glass and steel construction which will function as a glowing lantern after dark, the Europa Building will house Van Rompuy's offices and will be the venue for the summits after its completion in 2014.

With the EU ordering Greece to cut billions in public spending and undertake a €50bn privatisation round, while itself struggling to generate a €100bn bailout fund to save the country, Van Rompuy's brochure met with strong criticism. "The prime minister didn't think this was very well-judged," said a Downing Street source. "Taxpayers won't thank us for reminding them how much it costs."

The Downing Street entourage ensured that the pictures were made available to the British media, amid expressions of outrage from government sources.

At the press conference after attending his seventh EU summit, Cameron said: "I'm a practical, positive person. But when you see a document being circulated with a great glossy brochure about some great new building for the European council to sit in, it is immensely frustrating.

"You do wonder whether these institutions actually get what every country, what every member of the public, is having to go through as we cut budgets and try to make our finances add up."

An aide to Van Rompuy was unapologetic. "This was decided years ago, before the crisis. It will cost more now to cancel than to complete. It's good value."

Cameron said he found the current summit venue adequate: "I've only been to this building seven times in the last year, but it seems to do a perfectly good job of housing the European council."

He conceded that there was little prospect of halting the project – the contracts were awarded in 2005 – but said it should proceed with "economy and efficiency". He said the European commission and the European institutions had to demonstrate greater frugality. "Our voters, our constituents, our publics want to see us saving, not spending, money."

In Brussels it is already clear that cutting the cost of the EU will be the central campaign of Cameron's EU policy in the years ahead.

The prime minister emphasised the point by announcing that Sir John Cunliffe, his official civil servant adviser on Europe, and the architect of the "five tests" used in 1997 by Gordon Brown when chancellor to keep Tony Blair from taking Britain into the euro, would be the UK ambassador to the EU from January. "The prime minister wanted to make sure that a hard Treasury man was coming over to negotiate" the seven-year EU budget, an official said.

The commission in Brussels outlines its 2014-2020 budget proposals next week, signalling the start of an 18-month battle over rebates, farm spending and tax-raising powers. Cunliffe, said Cameron, is "a hugely accomplished civil servant with a great grasp of European issues".