Britainupdated 29m ago2 min read
Andy Burnham Says Russia Interfered in 2016 Brexit Referendum
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Burnham says it is clear Russia interfered in the 2016 Brexit referendum. He asked upon taking office and was told there was interference.
16 outlets told this the same way.
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Burnham: clear interference
Britain’s Prime Minister Andy Burnham said it is “clear” that Russia interfered with Britain’s vote to leave the European Union in the 2016 Brexit referendum, and he said he received “the clear answer that yes, there was.” Burnham said he asked advisers about possible Russian interference when he became prime minister in July, and he told The Rest is Politics podcast that “I’ve had the clear answer that yes, there was.”
“I've had the clear answer that, yes, there was.”
Burnham warned that similar activities were taking place in France and Germany, and he said “some of this politics is instigated via our enemies, namely Russia.” Burnham also said he spoke to German Chancellor Friedrich Merz about possible links between Russia and the far-right Alternative for Germany party when the two leaders met last week in Berlin, and he said Merz told him the AfD were “clearly linked to Russia, funded I believe.”
Pushback and context
Britain Unbound said Burnham’s comments were “another crude attempt to undermine the legitimacy of the decision that the British people made in 2016,” and it said foreign interference in UK elections was “obviously unacceptable.” Britain Unbound also said there was “no good reason to believe that Russian intervention influenced the outcome of the referendum in 2016,” and it added that it was “insulting to suggest that voters were so easily duped.”
Russia has long said it does not meddle in other countries’ elections or referendums, and a Kremlin spokesman said Russia did not meddle in other countries’ elections. Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee found in 2020 that the government failed to fully assess the impact Russian state-run media and “troll” accounts could have had on the EU referendum, and the committee’s report did not provide a definitive conclusion on whether Russia had attempted to influence the results.
What could happen next
The constitutional question in the United Kingdom is whether evidence of foreign interference would automatically annul the referendum or reverse the United Kingdom’s withdrawal from the European Union, and the Diplomacy and Law source said it would not automatically do so. The Diplomacy and Law source said the European Union Referendum Act 2015 established an advisory vote whose outcome did not itself authorize withdrawal, and it said the Supreme Court in R (Miller) v Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union [2017] UKSC 5 held that parliamentary authorization was required before ministers could initiate withdrawal under Article 50.
The Diplomacy and Law source said the Court of Appeal in R (Wilson and Others) v Prime Minister [2019] EWCA Civ 304 refused permission to appeal in proceedings challenging the legality of the Article 50 notification, emphasizing the referendum’s advisory character and the limits of statutory remedies. The Diplomacy and Law source said the central questions remained what Russia did during the 2016 campaign, whether its activities breached applicable legal rules, and what remedies, if any, remained available after Britain’s completed withdrawal from the European Union.