By: Jack Johnston
Source: Vote Leave |
The Leave Campaign printed
all over their bus, leaflets, posters, mugs and merchandise that they would
want to fund the NHS with an additional £350m if Britain left the European
Union. However, after £17m people voted to leave, leading Brexit campaigner –
Iain Duncan Smith – has made a major backtrack on that famous claim that
convinced many to vote Leave.
Speaking on the Andrew Marr
Show, Duncan Smith said that, “He had never made that claim during the
campaign.”
He also added, “The 350m was
an extrapolation of the £19.1bn – that’s the total amount of money we gave
across to the European Union. What we actually said was a significant amount of
it would go to the NHS. It’s essentially down to the government, but I believe
that is what was pledged and that’s what should happen. There was talk about it
going to the NHS, but there are other bits and pieces like agriculture, which
is part of the process. That is the divide up. It was never the total.”
To me, this feels like such a
huge betrayal from the Leave Side, who emphasised this point massively during
their whole campaign. A large proportion of the Leave voters, voted to fund
their NHS with an additional £350m. Yet now they’re likely to not get what they
voted for at all. Slowly, the lies behind their entire campaign are beginning
to unravel.
In fact, the repeated £350m
claim was being criticised from the out-set, with the Institute for Fiscal
Studies and the BBC stating that Britain’s actual contributions to the EU were
closer to £175m a week because of EU rebate.
Duncan Smith doesn’t appear
to be the only one who is taking a U-turn on the repeated pledge. UKIP leader –
Nigel Farage – also said that he could not promise money spent on the EU going
to the NHS instead. Of course he never was an official part of the Leave
Campaign, but it’s interesting that he never spoke out about the fake claims
until the referendum was over. In fact, I still don’t think that Nigel Farage
would’ve said anything about the £350m figures, had he not been asked about it
on ITV’s Good Morning Britain programme. This is helping me to understand why
people wanted a second referendum because voters were never aware about any of
this prior to voting.
This is just one of the many
truths beginning to unwind from the EU Referendum.
Leave's £350m Brexit Backtrack is a Huge Kick in the Teeth To Voters
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