Reality check verdict
The BBC looks at the things the Leave campaign said that, as soon as the vote was in, they said were not true. (You might think the short word for that would be “lies.” I couldn’t possibly comment.)
Immigration
The campaign claim: Immigration levels could be controlled if the UK left the EU. This would relieve pressure on public services.
The current claim: Immigration levels can’t be radically reduced by leaving the EU. Fears about immigration did not influence the way people voted.
Reality Check verdict: During the campaign, some Leave campaigners sent a clear message that the referendum was about controlling immigration. Some are now being more nuanced, saying the UK’s decision to leave the EU would not guarantee a significant decrease in immigration levels.
Immigration was the key issue of the EU referendum campaign, and Vote Leave’s focus on it was a key part of their strategy.
So that would be a lie then.
There’s a good deal more. All of it points in the direction of the Leave campaign’s having told whoppers.
Contributions to the EU budget
The campaign claim: We send £350m a week to Brussels, which could be spent on the NHS instead.
The current claim: The claim was a mistake, and we will not be able to spend that much extra on the NHS.
Reality Check verdict: Some of those who campaigned for Leave are now distancing themselves from this claim. Some have gone as far as admitting that it had been a mistake.
But not so far as admitting that it had been a lie. It sure looks like a lie though, given the big slogans on buses and then the “We never!”s on Friday.
The Leave campaign said the UK could eat its cake and still have it. After the election it said that once you eat your cake it’s gone, but they were going to try to persuade the EU to let the UK (or England and Wales) eat its cake and still have it anyway, in defiance of people’s usual disinclination to take possession of digested cake.
The digested cake is being reprocessed into a sandwich.
Mmmm, cake sandwich.
Wait.
It would be nice if there was this level of examination during the campaign.
It would have been lovely, Holms, if any of this had come across in live broadcasts before the vote. I tend to have BBC’s 24 news running in the background no matter what I am doing. No sign of it there!
BBC Radio 4 Today did a little better but not enough. Yet none of this is new, except the rapid retraction of a whole slew of things which might well have been seen as promises.
BBC management and news editors need to take themselves off somewhere and work out what “balance” actually means. It does not mean giving equal space to both a carefully prepared report by specialists and some bloke jumping up and down talking bollocks. Nor does it mean collecting all the hard information on its website, which it did, while serving up recycled gossip and yet another clip of Boris and his bus.
Are you listening, BBC?
Having spent a couple of days drowning my sorrow & rage over this Brexit business and feeling singularly unpatriotic, I was delighted to learn that Iceland beat England in the European soccer tournament and even more delighted by the Icelandic commentator’s ecstatic response at the end of the game:
‘This is done! This is done! We are never going home! Did you see that?! Did you see that?! Amazing! I can’t believe it! This is a dream. Never wake me up from this amazing dream!
Live the way you want England. Iceland is going to play France on Sunday. France Iceland! You can go home! You can go out of Europe! You can go wherever the hell you want! England 1, Iceland 2 is the closing score here in Nice! And the fairytale continues!’
This highlights one of the big problems with an ‘issue’ vote like this. At least with a typical election campaign, the candidates themselves can theoretically be held accountable for things they and their campaign said. (Trump is, admittedly, pushing this to the breaking point, but even there, he’s being constantly forced to walk back some of his claims. And it’s generally understood that in the worst-case scenario, the reality of the situation would be made immediately apparent and he’d face the voters’ wrath the next cycle [albeit, four years too late to prevent him from inflicting incalculable damage on the country].)
But this sort of thing… you’ve just got random loudmouths saying whatever they like, and no one is remotely accountable for any of the claims, and now that the vote’s over, they can attribute their own, personal reason to whatever few legitimate points might be made.
Where I work there was a lot of support for Brexit and immigration was the main reason given. One man even expressed a desire to stand on the South Coast and shoot immigrants as they arrived. I pointed out that leaving the EU would not stop immigration but they weren’t really all that interested.
The £350 million per week figure was another big factor. One colleague quoted it and then told me that he had never voted but now he was going to just to vote to leave the EU.
There’s been the usual musings about referenda over the last few days. How it’s kinda nutty dealing with anything halfway complex with these check one of two boxes things…
Had the thought: I’m not at all against them, personally. Contrary to certain standard insinuations from certain of the standard order (redacted), I think it’s best not only that governments should know what the people that elected them are thinking, but should, y’know, a) care, and b) attempt to address issues material to their prosperity and happiness–hell, probably even, subject to triage, c) to anxieties, irrational, not, or somewhere in between. Likewise, while, sure, I absolutely wouldn’t have voted with the some 52% who ‘won’ this last one, I do figure the government that doesn’t take this seriously isn’t being responsible. Sure, people were misinformed. But we usually are, to varying degrees. And that anger, that anxiety we’re seeing, it’s not going away. (Realistically, however, I suspect it’s not going away entirely however the sorry bastards who wind up in the committee rooms now play this, but this is a longer essay, and welcome to the complex reality of modern states and economies: the simple solution is simple in the sense that guy they held back in second grade is simple: seems nice, probably has untold strengths _somewhere_, but let’s just give him a little more time, shall we?)
Anyway, just spitballing it, I got to thinking: maybe what we need is something that’s a bit more _full-featured_ than your standard plebiscite.
Take your standard opinion survey. Non-binding, not very official, tends to wind up in desk drawers, gathering dust. May have more room for nuance (rank these positions, check D to leave additional comments). Then take your standard plebiscite. More allegedly compelling to legislators (and then again…), much higher profile, but a woefully blunt instrument. Pick one. Don’t care why, just pick…
What if we had a thing was a bit of both? Medium form ‘tell us what’s pissing you off’. Run like an election or referendum: results _will_ be public, no ifs ands or buts. Government to commit to meaningful action, given result. Yes, there’s tonnes of room to weasel around that simple rubric, but such is everything, and welcome to representative democracy, where, if you’re not a bit disappointed, you’re probably high or something.
Solves a few things. Not quite enforces–but strongly encourages–constructive civic engagement. Maybe gets people thinking in a bit more focused fashion. The legislature or committee to fight over things to rank and include, sure, but it’s always healthy to keep legislatures busy, I figure. Like in a plebiscite, you know ahead of time: you will answer by this day, this is the form to answer. But it’s longer.
And y’know what? I think, even _if_ 70% of voters just say ‘we hate the stinking darkies’, in effect, you probably want to know that. Kinda doubt, honestly, the numbers are gonna be quite that bad. But you’re still better off knowing. Maybe you get something milder. Even more understandable. Like listen, I’ve lived here my whole life, I can’t get a job, I keep thinking they gave the one I wanted to someone just got here from Poland, and listen, I never signed up for that, and listen, it’s kinda hard not to dwell on that while the next mortgage payment looms ever closer. Probably, you want to know that, too.
It has some issues, sure. Work in progress. One thought I have, oddly: anonymous comments themselves have certain… qualities. As the very internet demonstrates, vividly and hourly. There’s a gulf between asking people what they’re thinking and what they could stand their neighbors and families might know about what they’re thinking. I wonder sometimes which is actually more valuable for legislatures to know (it is not recommended they act with particular dispatch, for example, on sexual fantasies I might admit to while drunk or confident enough they will never be traced to me; such is the oddity of anonymity, at its most self-absorbed). And as may even contribute to the piquant flavor of certain recent disputes.
(Larger issues, here: supranational _anything_ is likely to be alienating, and has it escaped anyone that the larger the body, the more likely it is someone feels–even a lot of someones feel–lost in it, used by it, certain someone, somewhere is just dropping their concerns in the shredder? But we _are_, after all, intermittently clever, wise or no. And we’ve got our satellites and transceivers and wires. And I keep figuring: probably we can do better than this, at least, crowded and anxious as we are.)