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British Prime Minister David Cameron on Monday asked European Council President Herman Van Rompuy to prepare the European Council for a vote on the future president of the European Commission, Downing Street announced Monday.
Cameron made the request when he held talks with Van Rompuy in London on Monday afternoon.
"The Prime Minister also underlined the UK's cross-party opposition to the nomination of Jean-Claude Juncker as President of the European Commission. It would end the decades-long practice of always finding a candidate by consensus," a Downing Street spokesperson said following the meeting.
"It would ignore the clear pro-change and pro-reform message delivered by European voters in the recent European Parliament elections," the spokesperson added.
EU member state leaders are starkly divided over whether Juncker, the former Luxembourg prime minister, should become the next President of the European Commission (EC).
While German Chancellor Angela Merkel has shown firm support for Juncker as EC president, Cameron has voiced clear objections to Juncker's nomination.
Juncker, the chosen candidate of the centre-right European People's Party (EPP), is seen by Cameron and some politicians as an "old-style" federalist unable to generate the reforms which Britain needs.
"Simply accepting the 'Spitzenkandidaten (top candidate)' process would be an irreversible step which would hand power from the European Council to the European Parliament, with the risk that the European Parliament would dictate the European Union's agenda," Cameron's spokesperson noted in a statement.
"It would also politicize the European Commission and compromise its exercise of its important regulatory functions," the statement continued.
In the meeting, Cameron asked Van Rompuy to prepare a vote on Juncker's nomination, should the European Council choose to "depart from a consensus-led approach when it meets this week."
Van Rompuy agreed to work through how a vote would proceed, according to the Downing Street spokesperson.
Cameron has promised an "in or out" referendum on Britain's European Union (EU) membership by 2017 if his Conservative Party wins the general election next year. He has been seeking to renegotiate the terms of British membership in a reformed EU.
