Yesterday the Daily Mail published a story on its website headlined “£7,000 per person is the true cost of welfare as UK spends a quarter of national income on handouts”. This is a story about some data published by the EU which shows the amount each nation spends on ‘welfare’ – a measure which here includes healthcare and pensions. The Daily Mail calls these ‘handouts’. Is NHS care a handout now? The article below displays a bit more honesty (only a bit) and includes this chart (look at the chart title. Romania and France don’t even appear on the chart!)
It trumpets the fact that UK spending on welfare is 17.5% above the EU average, but then also says it is only the 15th biggest spender in the EU. You could just as easily (and perhaps more honestly) write the headline as :
“UK spending on welfare (including health and pensions) is lowest of any Western European nation” (OK so I wouldn’t make a good sub-editor, but you get the idea).
Hats off Daily Mail, hats off.
alittleecon 
Reblogged this on Britain Isn't Eating.
Reblogged this on sdbast.
Reblogged this on Beastrabban’s Weblog and commented:
More lying about state welfare expenditure by the Daily Mail in order to normalise the further destruction of the welfare state. As for Alittleecon’s rhetorical question of whether the NHS counts as a ‘state handout’, my guess is that the hacks at Paul Dacre’s diseased organ do indeed see it as precisely that, but are too scared to say so overtly just yet.
Complained to IPSO about the use of the word “handouts”
Reblogged this on The SKWAWKBOX Blog and commented:
We’ve seen this week how mendacious the government is in the way it refers to the cost of ‘welfare’ (it is no accident that this has become the preferred term rather than ‘benefits’) and in the way it treats benefit claimants.
Now we see how the government’s media allies routinely do the same to skew debate and perception and to mislead the credulous many.
Also note that Turkey and Switzerland aren’t even in the EU.
Reblogged this on markcatlin3695's Blog.