Having Won, 'Brexit' Campaigners Begin Backpedaling

By STEPHEN CASTLE, NY Times   JUNE 26, 2016

LONDON — Freed from the shackles of the European Union, Britain's economy would prosper and its security would increase. Britain would "take back control" of immigration, reducing the number of arrivals. And it would be able to spend about 350 million pounds, or about $470 million, a week more on health care instead of sending the money to Brussels.

Before Thursday's referendum on the country's membership in the 28-nation bloc, campaigners for British withdrawal, known as Brexit, tossed out promises of a better future while dismissing concerns raised by a host of scholars and experts as "Project Fear."

But that was before they won.

Perhaps no promise was more audacious — and mendacious, critics say — than the £350-million-a-week claim. Boris Johnson, the former mayor of London who was the frontman of the Brexit campaign, toured Britain in a bus emblazoned with the slogan: "We send the E.U. £350 million a week, let's fund our N.H.S. instead," a reference to the country's widely revered National Health Service.

Hours after proclaiming "independence day" for Britain, Nigel Farage, the leader of the fiercely anti-European U.K. Independence Party, conceded that the £350 million figure was a "mistake." The shift was perhaps unsurprising, since the £350 million "independence dividend" never stood up to scrutiny.

Promises to quickly reduce immigration levels are also being played down. Migration was the cornerstone of the Leave campaign, which objected to the European Union's insistence on the free movement of labor, capital, goods and services.

On Friday, the day after the referendum, Daniel Hannan, a member of the European Parliament and one of the most knowledgeable advocates of Brexit, stunned some viewers of the BBC by saying: "Frankly, if people watching think that they have voted and there is now going to be zero immigration from the E.U., they are going to be disappointed."


http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/27/world/europe/having-won-some-brexit-campaigners-begin-backpedaling.html?_r=0