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I got this propaganda leaflet through my door today, this has been widely claimed by parties in favor of the British EU referendum:

brexit claim

We send the EU £350 million a week - let's fund our NHS instead

Does UK send that much money to the EU every week? Would a "leave" vote give the government £350 million a week to use on NHS?

Andrew Grimm
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Sklivvz
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    While this claim is likely false, 47% of the British public believe it according to a recent poll: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/nearly-half-of-britons-believe-vote-leaves-false-350-million-a-week-to-the-eu-claim-a7085016.html – Sklivvz Jun 22 '16 at 13:34
  • "I got this propaganda leaflet ... today" - [FAQ: Should questions be asked with an impartial tone?](http://meta.skeptics.stackexchange.com/questions/1203/faq-should-questions-be-asked-with-an-impartial-tone). – Andrew Grimm Jun 23 '16 at 10:23
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    It is an impartial statement. "Propaganda is a form of biased communication, aimed at promoting or demoting certain views, perceptions or agendas.". Propaganda is not necessarily false. – Sklivvz Jun 23 '16 at 10:56
  • Even Farage claims to have erred in this: https://amp.twimg.com/v/6ca5195b-a8a5-4b20-b209-92440b9a25d6 – Martin Schröder Jun 25 '16 at 12:08
  • Btw, in the Farage interview on itv, the same claim was called "a huge part of the propaganda", I think this validates the usage of the word in the question: https://youtu.be/cA3XTYfzd1I?t=18s – Sklivvz Jun 28 '16 at 22:23
  • @AndrewGrimm do not unilaterally edit stuff we already debated. – Sklivvz Mar 21 '17 at 07:58
  • Related court case on the veracity (or not) of this claim, started this week: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-48445430 – A E Jun 01 '19 at 21:21

1 Answers1

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The claim is false.

According to the National Statistics Authority

The UK’s official gross contribution for 2014 before the application of the rebate was £19.1 billion. As I have made clear previously, this is not an amount of money that the UK pays to the EU each year. The full £19.1 billion is not a net contribution.

Letter from Sir Andrew Dilnot to Dominic Cummings

This is also confirmed by HM Treasury.

The problem with the claim is that first of all, a discount was negotiated by the UK in the 80's, so while the official membership cost is 19 billions, that money is not what is actually paid at all by the country. Secondly, part of those funds are returned later on to the country in form of subsidies.

A nice recap of this is provided by Full Fact which was further verified by In Facts.

enter image description here

Further debunking can be easily found on the Financial Times

Britain does not contribute a net £350m a week to the EU budget. Savings will not go automatically to the National Health Service.

and the Economist

Promises of more money rely on the claim that leaving the EU will save Britain’s EU budget payments of £350m ($510m) a week. But when the rebate and EU spending in Britain is accounted for, the net payment is only £120m a week.

pericles316
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Sklivvz
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    Does the leaflet, or any other pro-leave material, claim that the amount is a net amount, rather than a gross amount? – Andrew Grimm Jun 23 '16 at 09:50
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    It claims we "send" that money, that means that it's an actual amount we send, thus a "net" amount. – Sklivvz Jun 23 '16 at 10:00
  • You can send something from A to B and back to A again. (Sorry for repeated comment, previous one was missing a word). – Andrew Grimm Jun 23 '16 at 10:23
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    @AndrewGrimm yes, but that's not what's happening, the "rebate" happens before anything is sent. – Sklivvz Jun 23 '16 at 10:50
  • Note that according to the info graphic, it's still £173M a week: the claim is only off by a factor of two. – Ernest Friedman-Hill Jun 23 '16 at 12:31
  • @ErnestFriedman-Hill "only" by a factor of two? – Sklivvz Jun 23 '16 at 13:14
  • Ya factor of 2. 350/173 –  Jun 23 '16 at 13:30
  • That's not how error should be counted. Normally one privileges the *correct* value. Since the correct value is 173, the reported value is 102% off. – Sklivvz Jun 23 '16 at 13:32
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    They mean the same thing. Factor refers to the multiplicative constant > 1 that would be needed to turn one number into the other. There is no way errors *should* be counted, at least between these two alternatives. %increase and factor are both common. Using a factor-of presentation doesn't "privilege" any number. One number being 202% of another is the same as there being a factor of 2 difference between the two. –  Jun 23 '16 at 13:36
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    I agree that the claim is false; however, it appears that an almost equally worrisome true claim could also have been made. – Ernest Friedman-Hill Jun 23 '16 at 14:13
  • @ErnestFriedman-Hill You'd however have to put that cost against financial benefits for being in the EU in order to see if it was a worthwhile investment. And that's decidedly harder to quantify in terms of trade and access. Point is I doubt even after rebate and EU grants, the figure that's left isn't somewhat balanced by earnings from being in the common market. –  Jun 23 '16 at 15:06
  • How much should EU membership cost is a qualitative, subjective call, and we all have our opinions. How much it *does* cost, however, is not up for discussion. – Sklivvz Jun 23 '16 at 15:57
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    ***Only*** 120 million a week? What a relief... – LCIII Jun 27 '16 at 15:16
  • I assume the bill is to be paid in Euros, not pounds, so with the pound dropping massively the bill will go up. Thanks, Farage and Johnson. – gnasher729 Jun 27 '16 at 21:05
  • From the question: "Would a 'leave' vote give the government £350 million a week to use on NHS?" Maybe not £350, but how much? The more accurate £120? –  Jul 02 '16 at 03:28
  • I made a suggested edit that put the 120 million figure at the top of the post. You rejected the edit saying the amount seems incorrect. It's already in your answer, I just moved it to the top. –  Jul 02 '16 at 15:24
  • @fredsbend the money that gets paid is not 120. 120 takes into account the EU subsidies, which are variable and get paid back later. – Sklivvz Jul 02 '16 at 17:45
  • It also important to not that the money that goes to the EU and is not later spent in the UK is not "lost"; much of it goes on funding the institutions of the EU such as the EMA and so forth which carry out regulatory work that would need to be replicated if/when the UK leaves the EU. So the "recoverable" figure is vastly lower before even considering any economic cost to leave the EU. – Jack Aidley May 01 '19 at 08:46