If you like Fake News, you’ll LOVE Fake History!
And to get you going, here’s a classic of the exciting new media genre – propagated by none other than an elected representative who gets to vote on history-defining legislation, Daniel Kawczynski!
Yes, the Tory MP for Shrewsbury indulged in a tweet rewriting history over the weekend, claiming Britain had received no money from the Marshall Plan – payments from America to help rebuild Europe after the Second World War.
“Britain helped to liberate half of Europe,” he spewed. “She mortgaged herself up to eye balls in process. No Marshall Plan for us only for Germany. We gave up war reparations in 1990. We put £370 billion into EU since we joined. Watch the way ungrateful EU treats us now. We will remember.”
In reality, Britain received more money under the Marshall Plan than any other country – at 26 per cent of the aid.
Oh dear.
When called up on this on the radio by Alexis Conran, a presenter on talkRADIO, Kawczynski hung up live on air:
“Would you like to apologise for misleading your Twitter followers?”@AlexisConran gave @DKShrewsbury the chance to clarify his tweet saying there was ‘no Marshall Plan for us.’
He decided to hang up. pic.twitter.com/A8Sb9fDq1Y
— talkRADIO (@talkRADIO) February 3, 2019
Not only is the MP refusing to be held to account, he’s also perpetuating his error by refusing to delete his statement:
Britain helped to liberate half of Europe. She mortgaged herself up to eye balls in process. No Marshall Plan for us only for Germany. We gave up war reparations in 1990. We put £370 billion into EU since we joined. Watch the way ungrateful EU treats us now. We will remember.
— Daniel Kawczynski (@DKShrewsbury) February 2, 2019
Your mole guesses the silver lining of this tweet still existing is that we definitely WILL remember…