Myth: Quitting EU would allow UK to inject billions into NHS
InFact: The economic damage caused by Brexit would hit tax revenue, dwarfing any EU budget saving. There would be less money for the NHS, not more.
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Our net EU budget contribution of £6.3 billion a year amounts to 0.3% of GDP.
Leaving the EU would have a depressing impact on the UK economy, at the very least for a period of years during which the uncertainty over terms of leaving would discourage investment and consumer confidence. The OECD has estimated that there could be a 3% hit by 2020.
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The corresponding reduction in tax revenues due to just the cyclical dip would be around one-third of the GDP reduction, thus around 1% of GDP, on the OECD estimates. That would be roughly three times what we’d save on our budget contribution. In other words, the government would have less money to spend on the NHS and other public services, not more.
This article is an adaptation of a piece that previously appeared on InFacts.
Edited by Hugo Dixon
What a load of scaremongering rubbish. Due to controlled immigration, wages would go UP, prices kept artificially high by the EU would come down. We’d be better off after Brexit. Taken from someone else’s post ; There are huge economic benefits from coming out of the EU.
– We stop paying a net £70 billion membership fee over the next five years to Brussels. http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/SN06091/SN06091.pdf . Every single penny of that £70billion has to be borrowed, added to our state debt of £1.7 trillion and from the first minute adding interest to that debt, a double whammy.
– We can say no to millions of low wage , low skill EU immigrants who are depressing wages of low paid British workers and creating chaos in state services such as the NHS and education and overloading the state infrastructure. 630000 EU nationals given new NI numbers in the year to December, 209000 to Bulgarians and Romanians. https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/502613/nino-registrations-adult-overseas-nationals-feb-2016.pdf MigrationWatch says Brexit would cut net immigration by 100,000 a year , http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/immigration/12122518/Brexit-would-cut-net-migration-to-Britain-by-100000-a-year-claims-new-report.html . NI data suggests the cut would be substantially higher than that and would relieve pressure on hospitals, schools, infrastructure, jobs, wages and state finances.
– We get out of the protectionist and bureaucratic common agricultural policy, allowing us to recoup the £50 billion opportunity cost of CAP membership that we will incur over the next five years, for example by sourcing cheaper food from the rest of the world through free trade treaties instead of applying high EU tariffs. http://openeurope.org.uk/intelligence/energy-and-environment/cap/
http://www.express.co.uk/news/politics/632466/Farmers-better-Britain-leaves-EU-former-minister-Owen-Paterson
– We get back our UK fishing grounds, 70% handed over to the EU, gaining us £15 billion over the next five years. http://www.efddgroup.eu/images/publications/Stolen_Seas.pdf
– We set our own trade treaties and exit the protectionist and bureaucratic single market which costs business tens of billions of pounds a year and which have saddled us with a £89 billion annual trade deficit with the EU, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3439693/Britain-s-trade-EU-slumps-Major-boost-Leave-campaign-exports-outside-Europe-continue-soar.html , despite proof that EU setting our trade treaties and the single market are bad for British business. http://www.civitas.org.uk/content/files/mythandparadox.pdf . 200 SME’s have recently signed a letter to Cameron endorsing Brexit.
– We will continue to have major foreign direct investment into the UK. The $830 billion Norwegian sovereign fund says it might invest more after Brexit http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/03/10/norways-830-billion-wealth-fund-to-invest-in-uk-regardless-of-brexit/ HSBC will stay after Brexit, Honda, Hitachi, Toyota, Nissan, Vauxhall will all stay here, Avon has just announced it is setting up its global HQ in the UK so it’s not worried about Brexit. Neither are 73% of Chief Financial Officers who say Brexit will not affect their UK investment decisions http://www.cnbc.com/2016/03/14/brexit-wont-hurt-our-trade-with-uk-global-cfos.html
– As for the City, there’s growing consensus there that it will prosper outside the EU! Away from EU power grabs. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/12157846/UK-would-be-a-better-place-if-it-left-the-European-Union-claims-one-of-Londons-biggest-hedge-funds.html . Deutsche Boerse is so relaxed about potential Brexit it wants to merge with the London Stock Exchange.
– We can set our own energy policy instead of following the costly carbon emissions laws set by the EU
The EU is collapsing economically because of a dysfunctional currency, protectionism and bureaucracy, it’s got deflation and minimal economic growth, why attach ourselves to,that economic carcass?
So Brexit will benefit Britain economically, business costs will fall, global business will still invest here, food pbureaucracyrices will fall, we will get the controlled immigration we need, state spending will fall, we set our trade treaties and we are freed from single market.
Top level legal people have confirmed, legally, the trading deals we already have will still stand so there would be NO dip in trading
abseloute bullshit
You can tell the Tories want us to stay ,so they dont have to put more money in to the NHS but its also nice to see they have got the excuse ready for when the people vote leave