Prime Minister David Cameron is determined to use this week’s European Union summit to move talks on reforming Britain’s ties with the bloc onto the “next phase” despite the Greek crisis, his spokeswoman said yesterday.

Cameron, who has pledged to reshape his country’s EU relationship before holding an in-out membership referendum, has met or phoned 20 of the bloc’s 27 other leaders and will talk to the last seven before the summit begins to prepare the ground for his renegotiation push, spokeswoman Helen Bower said.

“Our focus ... is the European Council and moving to the next phase of those negotiations,” she told reporters, saying Cameron was aiming to talk to or meet the leaders of Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Lithuania, Portugal and Malta in the run-up to Thursday’s summit.

Prime Minister is seeking to reduce the EU bloc’s role in British life

Cameron will also join Queen Elizabeth before the summit in Germany, where he is expected to hold talks about his reform plan with Chancellor Angela Merkel. She has said she is ready to try to help Britain if she can.

British officials privately say Cameron’s intervention at the summit could be overshadowed by what could be the finale of Greece’s debt crisis. But Cameron has long intended to formally present his proposals there and must show his critics he is making headway. Despite winning re-election only last month with a surprise majority, he is already under pressure from an increasingly restless Eurosceptic faction of his ruling Conservative Party, who want him to explain his EU reform demands in more detail and be more ambitious in his renegotiation. There is also growing speculation about the referendum date as the issue threatens to overshadow his domestic reform programme and chip away at his party’s fractious unity.

Some media reports, citing unnamed sources within Cameron’s cabinet, have said the government is considering holding the plebiscite in the autumn of 2016. Spokeswoman Bower dismissed those reports on Monday, however, calling them “more speculation, more noise.”

She said Cameron hoped the summit could be a springboard for technical talks likely to last “several months” that would come up with solutions to Britain’s complaints about the bloc.

Cameron has said he wants to exempt Britain from the­ aim for “ever closer union”, win the right to sharply restrict EU migrants’ access to his country’s welfare system, and reduce the bloc’s role in British life where he deems it excessive.