UKC

Theresa May repeats the biggest, most egregious lie of all:

'In her interview with the BBC's political editor, Mrs May was asked if there would be a "Brexit dividend".

She replied: "Of course when we leave the European Union, we'll no longer be spending vast sums of money, year in and year out, sending that money to the European Union, so there will be money available here in the UK to spend on our priorities like the NHS and schools."

Aww shuddup moaning. We all know that in a year the winter fuel allowance for the elderly will be replaced by bundles of £twenties and a match.

Please explain?

Don't crack, never give her credit.

Is it that difficult? Should I paint it on the side of a bus so you can understand?

Painting things on the side of a bus is what got us into this mess in the first place!

If you stop trying to be condescending you might be able to see the difference between "There will be money available to spend on the NHS and schools" and"We will spend the £350million a week on the NHS"

Has anyone checked their Tax statement recently, right at the bottom of the list itemising how your taxes were spent, you'll find the amount spent on EU contributions. Out of the £8-9000 I pay in tax and NI it comes to £57 a year.

Represents astonishing value for money.

When in trouble, dig your own hole of lies deeper, that seems to be the PM’s strategy.

Just explain

So if there is £1 available she is correct, no ?

a) It's not vast sums, it's about 1% of the government's budget

b) We are part of the EU.  We aren't "sending" money anywhere.

c) Unless we stop doing all the stuff the EU does (farm subsidies, research funding, standards, trade deals), the money won't be available to spend elsewhere.  Since everyone now agrees we will be worse off on leaving , even if we do stop, it still won't all be available.

Apart from that she's spot on.

Forgetting the bus and the amount for the moment which is the lie?  The fact that an amount of money that currently goes to the EU will stay in Britain or that that money will be available to spend in the UK?  Both of those statements seem eminently true to me.  Whether that money will be spent on the NHS and education is of course another matter.

Al

You missed d) leaving the EU will decimate our economy (correct meaning of reduce by 10%) in the short to medium term at the very least, making any dividend fantasy.

No, that was in c).  I did of course miss

d)  Doing all the EU activity along will cost proportionally more, so there will be less to spend on other stuff. 

Again, Brexiters are simply liars.  They will no doubt go off in huff again when this is pointed out, but that doesn't alter the fact.

Some other money may leave the country in tariffs or perhaps just disappear due to reduced tax receipts.

Convenient.

As above, there will be less money, and it won't be available for other things because what the EU does highly efficiently, we will now have to do less efficiently, and in any case there will be less money.

So they are not true.  They are lies.

In 2016 the UK government paid £13.1 billion to the EU budget, and EU spending on the UK was forecast to be £4.5 billion. So the UK’s ‘net contribution’ was estimated at about £8.6 billion.

  So, the net , net amount is £8.6b in addition to stuff the EU already spends money on. That's about 17% of the defence budget or 5% of health spending.

  You're  "egregious lie" is apparently based purely on the subjective interpretation of "vast" and "send" (jesus wept!). Is that it, really. FFS. You guys are really scratching around.

  Any reasonable  person would say that she said what happens without being tricked into spinning it as a "brexit dividend" by Laura Kuensberg.

I didn't say that for convenience I was merely trying to get some of the emotion out of the debate.

Even the most ardent EU supporter surely does not think that the EU is efficient with regard to money.  I nearly fell off my chair when I read that. Of all the counter arguments you could have presented this must be the worst one.  Pasbury's reply did make some sense and given me some pause for thought however.

Al

Of course it's efficient FFS. One set of standards, not many. One trade deal, not many etc. etc.

UK Government spending for 2016-17 was budgeted as £772 billion. Assuming your 8.6 billion is correct, then that is about 1.1% of govt spending.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending_in_the_United_Kingdom

Eyeroll

Anyway, points c) and d). Actually don't bother. I know, black's  white and white's back.

  I know. In case you missed it, the point is that the interpretation of "vast" is subjective. In the context of the overall budget the sum is not "vast". In the context of specific spending that could be made possible it is "vast". Neither is an "egregious lie".

 I addressed already. It seems that you don't even read what is written just as you don't listen to what May said.

 "d" is not part of what May addressed. It is a follow on point and is, once again, a subjective judgement.

  There is no "lie". There is one word that may be open to argument. The "lie" is by Rob.

  Anyway. I just wondered if there was any substance that I'd missed to the accusation. There isn't, so I'll leave you to your daily therapy session.

Oh I accept that there must be some efficiencies of scale in that regard but I thought we were talking about money FFS.  I just added the FFS to maintain the high standard of debate and dismissiveness that you are demonstrating.

It's classic bullshit, not a lie as such but meaningless and constructed to mislead.

'...no longer spending vast sums of money...' Arguably true, vast is so very subjective. A casual listener could be totally forgiven for taking this to mean we won't be sending money to the EU which isn't the case.

'...there will be money...' True. Could be more, could be less but there won't be none and we're not improving our priorities, we're just spending an amount of money on them, could be more, could be less.

Brexit apologists will be swarming all this in a few years to claim she was very clear about de-funding schools and hospitals so it must be what the people wanted.

It's profoundly damaging our democracy but I don't see it can be stopped, it is working quite well for those who can walk the fine line without stumbling. Perhaps if someone can make honest plain speaking pay electorally we'll have our solution but so far it's not looking good. It's not new but it's getting worse.

jk

So a big number is vast compared to £8.6bn but some much smaller number is not vast compared to £8.6bn. Is that really the extent of your point?

  It's so bloody obvious that it's amazing Rob and MG "overlooked"  it isn't it?!!

I wonder why.

You forgot to mention this from the CBI:

• 71% of CBI member businesses report that the UK’s membership of the EU has had an overall positive impact on their business, including 67% of SME members. Only 13% said there had been a negative impact. Overall,78% said they would vote to remain in the EU in a referendum, with 77% of SME’s taking the same position.
• A CBI literature review suggests that the net benefit of EU membership to the UK could be in the region of 4-5% of GDP or £62bn-£78bn a year – roughly the economies of the North East and Northern Ireland taken together.

Just for balance like.

W

  I didn't forget to mention it. I was replying specifically to Rob's false accusation.

  I'm not interested in a general abuse session.

I don't know what I'm doing wrong here, but PMP seems to think I'm agreeing with him even though I'm not. And now you too...

FWIW I agree with the point you made.

May said that the UK's EU contrib was vast. PMP chooses an arbitrary subset of government spending as a comparison and uses that to claim that the meaning of vast is arbitrary and therefore May is not wrong. This ignores (a) that the size of the chosen subset and the size of the EU contribution are unrelated to each other and (b) you can prove anything if you get to choose the numbers.

Pat,  as jkarran pointed out, its not technically a lie she has told. but there is an impression created that after brexit there will be a meaningful and noticeable increase in  funding for  health and education. 

even if it were true that the net contribution to the EU were all spent on these priorities, say 50/50 between the NHS and schools, then the 4bn would  roughly equivalent to the extra investment needed in the NHS per annum to avoid a real terms cut in services. So its unlikely to be noticeable; and it certainly wont be the step change that people might expect if they formed a view that 'vast' sums of cash were to be invested in it. 

but she didnt even claim that's what will happen. she knows as well as we do that there will be other demands on that money as we replicate functions current delivered at EU level, reconstruct a border that is fit for purpose, satisfy the calls from farmers, fishermen, the regions, industry, that they not be disadvantaged by the change. 

so she was creating an impression of an outcome that she knows is not going to happen- but was careful with her language so that she has the defense that she didn't actually claim it at along. it may not be a lie, but its dishonest, and is doing nothing to prepare people for the outcome which is inevitable: that even in a best case scenario, the people that voted to leave the EU because they thought it would improve their lives are not going to see their lives being any better. they are going to be disappointed, and will want to blame someone. its impossible to predict who, but whoever it is, the overall impact is not going to make the  country a better place to live in 

  So, we're agreed that she didn't lie. She created the impression that there will be a "meaningful" (your word) amount of money available to spend on "our priorities" which she rightly says include health and education.

Personally I regard that as a true and not misleading statement because I understand that "meaningful" does not mean transformative and that any benefits, unless very specifically targeted will be small in the greater scheme of things. Others may disagree but the real takeaway for the interview, as I said, was her trying NOT to be caught hyping the issue by using the phrase "brexit dividend". The remainer fanatics  on UKC then attack her as if she had hyped up a "brexit dividend" by pointing out the potential offsets to the £8.bn. Egregious......

Surely it would have been more accurate to say that any direct "brexit dividend" would be small? To come out with a load of positive sounding hot air makes it look like she thinks there is a brexit dividend

everyone will look at her comments and take what they want from them. not everyone follows politics as closely as we do or analyses the text and subtext to the same degree. i think that anyone reading her comments who saw the  juxtaposition of 'vast sums' now being available, and the NHS and schools being our priorities, and formed a view that 'vast' amounts would now go to these areas- and that 'vast' sums would bring about a meaningful difference in the service- would have made a reasonable inference. 

of course, we both  know that's not what she said at all; but then most people aren't sat round posting about the minutiae of brexit on  internet forums and have got busy lives and other priorities, so may only hear this soundbite on the news and not pursue the point further. note: this is not the same as saying such people are dim, its just pointing out that they are not politics geeks and prefer to spend their time doing other things.

May knows this, has crafted her comments carefully to take advantage of this situation. not a lie; but not the whole truth either. and perpetuating the notion that many people who voted brexit will see their lives improved, so increasing their anger when they find out that they aren't

Oh for goodness sake, the BBC have this as their headline 'May - Brexit allows more for NHS and Schools.'

Pretty carefully calibrated to imply that the government will be better off as a result of Brexit - which it already knows and has acknowledged it won't be - and that extra money will be spent on those departments.

Where not out yet, so do have to do a fraction of the things that our contribution pays for, however in starting to prepare the annual civil service bill has gone up by more than £2bn.

that's what i'm saying Rob- 'allows'- carefully chosen to give the impression  of 'vast' investment, when the reality will of course be very different. a lie? no. dishonest? yes. damaging when people realise the reality? very. 

Sorry, I was agreeing with you, just exasperated at the absolute deliberate and calibrated misuse of language. 'Orwell,  thou should'st  be living at this hour.'

You forgot the £1 billion back in research grants. Anyway, what's your point? It's still a drop in the ocean compared to education and NHS spending, and getting that money back won't give TM a great deal to spend on those. And you haven't counted all the inevitable Brexit costs that will probably swallow the returned money up.

You're actually looking in the place for egregious lying: Boris was on the case yesterday:

"Fantastic news about NHS funding - the fruits of a strong economy and a Tory government. Stand by for Brexit dividend !!"

   As explained above ,I didn't forget to mention it. I was replying specifically to Rob's false accusation (of an egregious lie).

  I'm not interested in a general  abuse session. Sorry.

"Monty Pythons life of Brexit"

What have the EU ever done for us ...

Well yeah there is infrastructure , security , health and safety , regulations ....

Just when I was starting to give her credit...

I knew there was something disturbing me in the back of mind when I first saw that ^.
It was that ^^^

Neither am I. Why are you addressing that to me? I haven't abused you. 

Because I was explaining to you why you I had not addressed other broader issues and that's normally what these threads become. Nothing personal.

Ok, no problem...

I think PP's point is that May's statement was not a lie, merely dishonest.

To be fair, I think he's right about that.

jcm

He does not appear to think it is dishonest. That was I understood him to mean when he said that her statement wasn’t misleading. Which seem to be somewhat contrary to the available facts.

It's not dishonest but it's open to differing interpretations depending on what you want it to mean. She's a politician, Prime Minister Theresa, not Mother Theresa FFS. Applying standards to her that she makes no particular claim to (unlike Jezzer) and one wouldn't apply any other politician is ridiculous, let alone regarding a little creative ambiguity as "egregious lies'.

Calm down folks, nothing to see here....

I know, politicians have been spouting 'truths' written by their script writers for hundreds of years and the proletariat and the supposed intellectual numpties lap it up.

We all know it's bullshit.

A definition of lie I found

"present a false impression" 

The  false impression is that when answering a question on a brevity dividend you imply that additional money will be spend on the NHS and education. 

The 'actual' interpretation had now been mooted as 'at least one pence will be spent on something we feel is a priority'. 

(edited to remove odd ? Symbols) 

I think there is something to see, but it’s  not quite what Rob is seeing. The striking thing overall in that interview is that she’s back-pedalling away from the Johnsonian hype in favour of a much lower key view. The emphasis on ‘it will be different’ hints at a distinct lack of enthusiasm for Brexit. 

Her main job at the moment is to lower expectations. And there is a lot more “expectations management” to be done.

The brexiteers in the cabinet are pretty much all in back-pedalling mode at the moment (except Johnson but he’s just the king’s fool).

The problem is that I don’t see the brexiteers in the electorate being of the same mood. It will take time before perceptions in the public come back to reality.

  So pretty much what I said at 17.11. "Others may disagree but the real takeaway from the interview, as I said, was her trying NOT to be caught hyping the issue by using the phrase "brexit dividend". The remainer fanatics  on UKC then attack her as if she had hyped up a "brexit dividend" "

It must be right , today's Grauniad agrees with me

Why do you think it is a lie?

I voted to remain and still stand by that choice, but I find it very hard to see why anyone would claim that this simple statement is a lie.

OK when asked 'if there would be a "Brexit dividend"' the truthful answer  would have been something like this:

'No of course not, not in our lifetimes anyway. The analysis that the government has done points to a significant decline in economic growth after Brexit, which inevitably means a reduction in tax revenues; so when you factor in the cost of the divorce settlement, the direct costs we are incurring simply negotiating this exit, the UK farming and development subsidies we will continue to have to pay, the costs we will incur implementing border infrastructure, the additional recurring costs required by C & R to administer the new regimes, the 100% of legal costs we will incur negotiating trade deals that were otherwise being negotiated for us, the additional costs of being outside the EU that we will incur participating in EU based institutions... no, no dividend, but I promise not to target the NHS or education budgets to pay for all this disproportionately.' 

The gap between that and what she actually said could at the very least be described as 'economical with the actualite'.

A nice pithy answer. Stick to the day job.

The question was posed as quite a narrow one on sources of funding so it got a narrow answer.

There’s still a measure of political manoeuvring that is being deliberately deceptive. Someone has mentioned being economical with the truth, and that’s one way of putting it. 

Nice to see you agreeing with the Guardian again! 

  I'm not interested in a general  abuse session. Sorry.

Here we go. yet another brexiter broken promise...

Politician politically manoeuvres, shock, horror! Like I said, she's not Mother Theresa.

Emily Dickinson may have something to say on this:

Tell all the Truth but tell it slant –
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
The Truth’s superb surprise

As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind –

The question is then: who is May seeking to protect by such slanted truth? What would be the outcome if she were to tell it straight?

Hark at Andrea Leadsom!

Yes, there will be a Brexit dividend. When we leave the remoaners will stand by their principles and work towards a better Britain.

Thanks for that - new to me.  I wonder if May is working on the basis that “The Truth must dazzle gradually”  and we’ll see more Brexit realism?

I suspect that your willingness to tolerate political manoeuvring (otherwise known as serving bullshit to the electorate) extends only to your own little political cult.

The opposition to Brexit is all about working towards a better Britain. 

The Brexit dividend may turn out to be a sudden and jarring encounter with reality for the Brexiters. But there’ll always be Europe and the remainers to blame, so not much chance of that. 

So, we seem to have a consensus: that May's statement was not a "lie" let alone an "egregious lie". It was just a politician being political, which you can judge as you wish.

Good; point made. Happy Easter all x

Isn’t that the problem though, Pat? We are where we are in part because a significant proportion of the population feel politicians have been saying one thing but meaning something else, in order to advance the interests of a narrow group of  people they actually represent, to their detriment, for as long as they can remember.

A lot of people were engaged by the Brexit vote who have previously been turned off politics, and believed that this was a chance for them to vote for a future more in tune with what they wanted. Plenty of leave campaigners told them that their vision of Brexit was easily deliverable, and that they would be listened to for once.

so when it turns out that this isn’t going to happen, how will these people feel? Will they shrug their shoulders and philosophically say “it’s just politicians politically manoeuvring, ah well”?

I doubt it. If  there is not real expectation management well in advance of the final agreement, rather than ambiguous statements that people can see what they want in, then the damage this will do to the democratic process will be substantial. This is a bigger issue than everyday politics, where people get to make another choice in a few years; the anger if people feel they have been ignored, even used, on this issue will be deep and long lasting.

if there was one time when it was vital that politician refrained from ‘politics’, it is now. Especially in the case of a prime minister who has volunteered to navigate the country through the most turbulent period of constitutional change in generations.

  If we want to have a broad debate about how politics should be conducted (and the media's culpability in debasing it)then it's a subject for another thread. My contribution to this  thread is about whether May was telling an "egregious lie".

The opposition to Brexit is mainly the whinging and complaining of remoaners who didn't get what they voted for, and thyem wanting a second referendum in the vain hope that the way the EU has treated the UK since the poll will somehow, strangely, make Britons more inclined to stay in.

I'm sure that remoaners will continue to praise the remaining countries subjugation to the will of Germany and France, even when the EU goes to the wall without it's cash cow.

If it was a just a thread over whether she had told an egregious lie, then it wouldn’t still be going after this long. It was clearly established that she didn’t days ago, and even rob has accepted that.

but if we took that view, that threads were restricted to determining the accuracy of single points of fact, then this would be a pretty dry place. 

Threads always broaden into related matters; and in this case, the interesting, rather than trivial, discussion is this one- is business as usual politics ok here, or given than we are in this situation because of business as usual politics, should we expect more candidness, especially from the Prime Minister?

In other news the CEO of Apple has decided to stop buying phone screens, chips and lithium batteries.   Declining to comment on reports that there were massive penalty clauses in the contracts with existing suppliers he noted that Apple would save tens of billions of dollars by not buying the components which make their phones work and those savings could be spent on priorities like shiny new buildings and executive salaries.

A bit like the way the Leave contingent has whinged and moaned for over forty years until they got a second referendum then. And here comes the EU-blaming already...

What subjugation? More fantasy... And as for the cash cow, the UK is not the biggest contributor to the EU budget. What's more likely to damage the EU is the all-round economic disruption that Brexit is already causing. 

Lying. Misleading deliberately. Being economical with the truth... My test is did casual listeners take from what was said what was meant. My experience talking to my partner last night is that the answer is no, she took that May is claiming there will be extra money for the NHS from brexit. She doesn't believe it and was surprised May would make such a claim. She's interested and bright. What do you reckon the rest of the populace took May to mean? Not what she said. Whether that's dishonest doesn't really matter, it's dangerous.

Jk

It could be she is lying but you can't say that now on the basis of she said it and some people don't believe it.  If in 3 years time extra money is not spent on things that the UK parliament want it to be spent on then it would be fair to say she has lied.

Al

It's a lie and it doesn't matter whether they spend more on the NHS or whatever: it is still a lie.

It is a lie because she is clever enough to know there is no 'Brexit dividend'.  The whole 'savings' thing is a manipulation designed to hoodwink the mathematically challenged.  Sure we will send less money to the EU in normal payments but we will pay a lot of money to the EU in 'divorce settlement' payments and we will spend *more* money on doing all the things the EU used to do for us.   However, the single biggest factor is not how much we spend but how much less income we will have to spend as our economy suffers from the disruption.  Overall every respectable economist believes that in the short to medium term we make a loss.  There is no 'dividend'.

Of course the government if it wants to play games it can still spend more on the NHS or whatever and pretend it came from a Brexit dividend.  Money is fungible and they can borrow it or take it from some other budget.  

You wanted the UK out of the EU, you won, why are you still whining and moaning and playing poor little victim ?

What did you think ? That the world was a nice place full of people who want to pursue our best interest to the detriment of their own ? Why don't you grow up and try to do something useful ?

Unfortunately this is pretty much the state of UK politics these days. Whether it's Labour or the Conservatives they are stuck in this vicious circle of populist politics. If you tell voters the truth then you lose vote so you need to pile more lies.

It feels as if even the Brexiteers in the cabinet don't even believe in their own garbage anymore.

Educated commentators outside of the UK are absolutely gobsmacked at the state of politics in this country, especially given that just a few years ago they use to admire and look up to the UK for its grown up politics. I hope things go back to normal at some point.

To her credit it seems Theresa May is trying to bring things back down to earth, although not as fast as we would like, and she's well regarded in the EU for that. She's got her own bee in the bonnet on other issues though.  

Sorry, if you mean unanimity, then no, there is not. I do not concur with the definition of lie you prefer being the only one applicable. 

If you mean general agreement  then I would concede. 

Ask yourself this, Big, if your side had lost would you be now all great for the EU? You're talking about making Britain a better country; to us Remoaners, Brexit is a massive step away from a better country. It makes you wonder why Trump, Le Pen, Putin et al, think Brexit is a good thing, doesn't it? No? I can't see into the future but unless the voters of this country start thinking again, we're boogered.

No it won't be fair, she never said 'extra money', she said 'money', it could be more, the same or less, one thing it will never be is 'no money' spent on health and education. It's just bullshit. It's meant to sound good without really saying anything at all. She's impressively good at it or well prepared.

It's fair to say today that continuing to mislead people in this way will ultimately have serious consequences for her legacy, government and our democracy.

jk