Renzi tells EU Commission to prove they're not just bureaucrats

MILAN, Nov 6 (Reuters) - Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi on Thursday called on the European Commmission to prove it was more than a group of bureaucrats by changing EU budget rules to allow more room for spending on investments.

Speaking at a campus of telecoms group Alcatel Lucent near Milan, Renzi referred to an ongoing spat with European Commission president Jean-Claude Juncker, who this week took the 39-year-old premier to task over his dismissive attitude towards the Commission.

Renzi denied he had described the Commission as a "cove of bureaucrats" but said it had a "concrete chance to prove it isn't a place of bureaucracy by excluding spending on innovation, technology and broadband from the calculations of the Stability Pact."

(Writing By Gavin Jones)