No one said they didn’t want these kind of projects. They just didn’t want to have to pay for them.
I lived in Britain during the Leave campaign and it was all about getting the benefits without the responsabilities or costs.
In fact, the sequence of political events that lead to the Leave Referendum was Britain in the EU trying to have less and less obligations whilst keeping the benefits of Membership to the point that eventually, when the UK demanded “otherwise we have a Referedum on Leave” to not to have to abide by Freedom Of Movement into their country whilst keeping all the rest including Freedom Of Movement for Britons into other EU countries, the rest of the EU said “No!”. After this, David Cammeron was under huge pressure to do the Referendum “to show the EU” and the rest is History.
The La-La-Land fantasism of the Leave side was always unbelievable, with everything from genuine expections of, post leave, having “Same Rights as Members With No Obligations”, to after Brexit “Other EU Nations will Follow Us Out”.
I would say that by this point it’s clear that whatever Britain is “showing the EU” isn’t quite what was in Leaver fantasies.
I’m definitely just a dumb American but I love how apparently “What is Brexit” was the biggest UK web search the day it got approved.
To be fair that is because it was sold to the public on outright lies and the readings of a couple of unscrupulous twats.
Johnson for example had always been pro-eu and reportedly had two articles written, one remain and one leave, and based his decision of which one to publish on which was more politically expedient for him, not on what he actually thought was better for the country.