The Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA), the British research institute, announced a contest for the best feasible solution concerning the UK exit out of the European Union. As it was stated in the IEA’s media release, the winner will be awarded the cash prize to the value of €100,000 ($131,000).
The award founders also intend to allocate the extra prizes for the second and third places in the contest - €10 thousand and €5 thousand accordingly. Moreover, the IEA promised €5 thousand for a project suggested by a contestant under 30 years old.
Those wishing to partake in the contest have to file their applications until September 16 of the current year; the best 20 will be selected by the IEA. The participants competing in the finals will have to polish their feasible solutions until February 2014. The board will unveil IEA award winners in March the same year. Nigel Lawson, ex-finance minister of the UK, is among the judges of the contest.
Back in 2011, the similar award for the best concept of leaving the EU by one or several countries was created by Lord Simon Wolfson, chief executive officer of British retail chain NEXT. Wolfson Economics Prize amounted to £250 thousand ($390 thousand). The analysts’ team from Capital Economics under the direction of Roger Bootle was called the prize winner; the recognition gift was handed to Jurre Hermans, a schoolboy from the Netherlands and the youngest nominee to the award.
David Cameron, the UK prime minister, promised early in the year to reconsider the UK’s membership conditions in the EU with the European authorities. If Cameron’s party wins the parliamentary election in 2015, he is going to hold a referendum until 2017 about the possible exit of Great Britain out of the EU.
