The ancient Romans knew they were doomed – sic transit Gloria mundi. The modern Romans – followers of the Treaty of Rome – are also transiting, writes Schadenfreude, our secret columnist in Brussels.

Here is a reconstruction. Some bright spark in the European Commission’s Budget Directorate finds that there are new ways of calculating Gross National Product (GNP). GNP is the basis of the calculation, with frills, of how much Member States should pay into the European Union Budget. New methods bring in activities hitherto ignored, including, for example, the value of prostitution services. True.

Thus emboldened the Commission tells the Member states to recalculate their GNP using the new data. National Statistical Services comply. Commission economists combine the results which show that some Member states are underpaying, largely because their economic policies are working, whereas others are paying too much because their GNP is down.

Politically savvy Commission bosses would see that this is a hot potato. The sensible way to handle it is to put the new data into the next budgetary round in which the Member States will argue about the bill, will negotiate a solution for themselves and life will go on more or less.

The Commission sees it differently. It decides to make the adjustments there and then. Some Member States get a rebate, others a bill. Non-payers will be fined. It is in essence penalising the conduct of successful national economic policies and rewarding the less successful.

Meanwhile in the world outside the Brussels bubble national governments are with varying success emerging from the 2008 crash and talking, along different lines, about reforming the EU to make it work better from their national standpoint. The British are the most vocal, and so it is that the British get the largest new GNP-based bill. It seems that somewhere along the line the national statistical service did not tell the political body clearly enough that there are new calculations which affect the EU budgetary bill. Hence shock, horror and outcry.

Nobody emerges with credit from the episode. The British add one more to their list of grievances. Europhobia gains ground. The Commission seems to be out of touch with realities.

And it could have been avoided if properly handled. At both ends.