EPA The EU has splurged more than £4 billion on foreign aid in one month

FREE now and never miss the top politics stories again. SUBSCRIBE Invalid email Sign up fornow and never miss the top politics stories again. We will use your email address only for sending you newsletters. Please see our Privacy Notice for details of your data protection rights.

Eurocrats splashed out the jaw-dropping sum of money on programmes including combatting racism against migrants, bankrolling Government reforms and, perhaps most incredibly of all, directly financing national budgets. They authorised 15 bank-busting payments to 29 countries in the space of just 15 days in December, embarking on a staggering splurge at a time when voters in Europe are suffering under crushing austerity regimes. Astonishingly just five of those countries are ranked in the top half of nations in terms of institutional corruption, with most of them judged to be in the worst 50 globally.

The figures, uncovered by the pro-Brexit Facts4EU.Org news site, show that British taxpayers will be stung for an eye-watering £462,000,000 to pay for the projects, and could be required to carry on funding them even after the country has left the EU in spring 2019. Critics today blasted the payments, saying the EU has "no right" to blow hard working families' money abroad and adding: "At Christmas we should remember charity starts at home." Earlier this month, Brussels agreed to hand over an jaw-dropping £1billion to the African nations of Ethiopia, Niger, Mali, Nigeria and Senegal, which between them register an average ranking of 99 out of the 168 nations included in Transparency’s 2015 corruption index.

FACEBOOK British aid payments have come under cover after an Ethiopian girlband received £5 million

PA International Development Secretary Priti Patel has vowed to review spending

The cash will predominantly be used to bankroll educational projects and boost economic growth in a desperate attempt by eurocrats to dissuade a second massive wave of African migrants from heading to Europe and overwhelming struggling member states. Even more astonishingly, eurocrats signed off on £157million of taxpayers’ cash being sent to the tiny African state of Benin - the 83rd most corrupt country on earth - which will be used to “increase the government's budgetary capacity”. And Somalia, which is blighted by Islamist terrorists and pirates and is ranked the world’s second most corrupt country, will benefit from a £145million aid pot to “tackle the root causes of instability and irregular migration”. Brussels will also splurge £31.5million combatting racism against migrants trying to reach Europe via Tunisia and Morocco, and pledged an eye-watering £511million to help uphold a peace deal in Colombia between the Government and rebel fighters.

The EU has no right to be so free and easy with our money Ukip MEP Bill Etheridge

Ukip MEP Bill Etheridge blasted: "This list of UK taxpayer money going abroad to unaudited projects is theft from our own pockets. "The EU has no right to be so free and easy with our money particularly to organisations which have not had proper scrutiny. "Foreign aid is already being incorporated into our defence policy, with 10 per cent of the infantry's strike capacity being allocated to projects abroad as part of our foolish determination to use internationalism as a form of political control. "There are places this money is actually needed. And at Christmas we should remember charity starts at home."

The payments will likely prove controversial with European taxpayers who have endured almost a decade of stagnating wages, limited job opportunities and crushing austerity. They will fuel the cause of populist parties across the continent who argue that sending so much cash abroad is a waste because it is frittered away on corruption, and that the money should be spent helping Europe’s poor instead. Britain’s controversial pledge to spend 0.7 per cent of GDP on foreign aid, enshrined in law by David Cameron, has also come increasingly under fire following a series of scandals about how the cash is spent. It has emerged that vast amounts of taxpayers’ money has been splurged on consultants and pen-pushers, while the Government has also resorted to dumping money with the World Bank to meet the spending pledge.

Peak inside the £270m home of the European Council Tue, May 16, 2017 This will become the new home of the European Council Play slideshow 1 of 11