UKIP Uncovered

UKIP Uncovered
What motivates the leaders of the United Kingdom Independence Party?

Saturday, September 27, 2003

How Far Right?

An article we came upon this week described "a minor British MEP, an unknown called Nigel Farage, who represents the right-wing UK Independence Party....Mr Farage's party is of the Far-right."

Many ordinary UKIP members will vehemently dispute that tag, as I myself frequently had to do during my brief time within the Party. The reason for this is of course that while the tag may be untrue or indeed unfair, the perception is nevertheless widely held.

Members of UKIP who boast of the clear party policy statement of racists forbidden must also appreciate the damage unremarked press statements and comment such as that linked in the posting below to a Guardian article cause to the validity of that claim.

The leadership of the party has had links with other groups to the right of the political spectrum that many voters would consider unacceptable. Roger Knapman has associations with the Monday Club, always to the right of the Tories and within such a group has no qualms at being associated at the last Conservative Party conference with a Right-wing action meeting within that right wing body. Mike Nattrass had associations with the New Britain Party and stubbornly refuses to disassociate himself from Peter Troy guilty of knowingly recruiting a BNP member and activist into UKIP. The longstanding and never to be silenced rumours regarding Nigel Farage and other members of that racist party are well known and fully discussed within this blog.

According to recent Opinion Polls more than one third of the people in Britain wish to withdraw from the European Union. In the latest Eurobarometer Poll undertaken by that organisation only 30 per cent of Britons think our membership is a good thing. There is theoretically therefore a huge majority who would not object to withdrawal. If something is perceived as not being good the obvious action is to withdraw, so think 70 per cent of our countrymen and women.

Yet none of the three major political parties offer a policy for withdrawal. The only political party so to do is seen as being a creature of the right and therefore an unacceptable electoral choice for the vast majority. On top of that, as readers of this blog now well know, UKIP is rotten at the top, mismanaged and financially unsound.

Last weekend Tony Blair flew off to Berlin and according to the French and German Press gave away our independence on matters of defence. According to Le Figaro as I quoted on the blogspot Ironies, he conceded those points bitterly resisted and fought against at Nice. This was not a part of an International Treaty meeting but a closed door session with France and Germany in Berlin, continuing the process Blair began at St Malo with Chirac several years ago. There has as far as I can determine been silence from the Leader of the Opposition on this matter, so it appears another sell out to Europe has been agreed between the two major parties as so many times before during the past half-century. (Only 26 per cent of Britons think a Common European Defence is a good thing according to the same Eurobarometer Poll, WHAT POSSIBLE JUSTIFICATION DOES THAT PROVIDE BLAIR?)

UKIP as presently led and constituted cannot lead the way against either the Referendum, or the still encroaching EU. The Tories are to be fully supported while they fully join the fight for a referendum on the EU Constitution, but a further rallying point for the majority of Britons from across the political spectrum who want out of the EU is now ever more desperately required.

posted by Martin |9:00 AM