The public view of how much we pay to the EU

Grateful to Tim Montgomerie for tweeting this opinion poll result on how the public sees the claim at the centre of Vote Leave's campaign that Britain supposedly sends £350 million a week to the EU.



Nearly three-quarters of voters take one of two possible intelligent and well-informed positions on the subject. 37% - the largest group by one percentage point - think that the figure is exaggerated and the Leave campaign should be ashamed of themselves. (That is my position and I would also criticise the Remain campaign for some of the statistics they have used.)

Another 36% realise that the £350 million figure is exaggerated but consider the amount we actually do pay (the net figure is about £161 million a week) is still too much. That is an entirely legitimate and reasonable opinion.

14% give an "other" response or admit they don't know.

Unfortunately there were some respondents who have fallen for the misleading propaganda of the Vote Leave campaign and ticked the "The £350m figure is about right" box but I was pleased to see that this was only 14% of the sample.

Both sides should take note of this and stop underestimating the intelligence of the voters. As Abraham Lincoln put it:




Comments

Jim said…
I fall into the same group as you I think. The worst of it is good people on the leave side have been undermined by this and other "vote leave" too.

as my mother used to say "with friends like those, who needs enemy's?"
6:30 am
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