This week, we also looked at how much the government’s Test and Trace app has cost
21 Aug 2020 | Facts and news from Full Fact
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** FACT CHECK
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** It’s not true that migrants get a free TV licence
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A social media post shared 28,000 times claimed that “those who fought on the beaches of Northern France now have to pay for their TV licence,” while those who “arrive from the beaches of Northern France today”—meaning migrants and people seeking asylum— get it for free.
Although it’s true the free licence fee for over 75s has now ended, migrants arriving in this country do not receive a free television licence.
Government advice for asylum seekers clearly states: “Your accommodation provider is not expected to provide you with a television, but if you do obtain a television or watch TV programmes online, you will need to obtain a TV licence.”
Creative license ([link removed])
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** FACT CHECK
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** Gavin Williamson did not say teacher assessed grades will see pupils overpromoted into jobs later in life ([link removed])
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Gavin Williamson was widely misquoted as having said that the danger of basing pupils’ grades solely on teacher assessments is that they “will be overpromoted into jobs that are beyond their competence.”
This can be traced back to a tweet by financial journalist Philip Coggan, who was reacting to an article written by the Education Secretary in the Daily Telegraph.
Mr Williamson’s comments actually suggested that students’ grades would be seen as devalued by potential future employers.
Coggan later emphasised that his tweet was “a joke.” Unfortunately, many people didn’t get it.
The fake quote was shared by journalists Piers Morgan, John Crace and Adam Boulton, actor David Schneider, Labour MP Toby Perkins and Labour peer Lord Andrew Adonis. It was also reported or featured in the Guardian, HuffPost and the Indy100.
How a misquote goes viral ([link removed])
** FACT CHECK
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** The Test & Trace App has cost £11 million so far—not £300 million as claimed ([link removed])
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A Facebook post shared more than 6,000 times wrongly claimed that the government’s “£300m track and trace app has quietly been binned.”
The cost of the app is actually about £10.8 million so far and, although the app has not been released to the wider public yet, trials of it are ongoing at the time of writing.
Due to problems with the original design, the government changed direction with the app, and is now developing a solution created by Google and Apple.
Media reports that the government either performed a U-turn or abandoned its previous form are not necessarily wrong—but claiming that the app has been “quietly binned” is not correct.
As for the £300 million figure: there’s no evidence for this. So where did it come from? The confusion may have arisen from the fact that in May, the government announced a £300 million funding package for local authorities to support test and trace services in general across England. But the app is only one part of the wider test and trace effort.
The current state of the app ([link removed])
** FACT CHECK
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** Also this week...
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* mRNA vaccines are being developed for Covid-19, but they do not change your DNA ([link removed])
* Photo of ‘migrants seeking asylum in England’ was actually taken in Germany ([link removed])
* And no, you cannot catch Legionnaires’ disease from a face mask ([link removed])
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