Another UKIP Scandal

Crampton and UKIP leader Farage

Only this morning I posted about the pitiful election leaflet we have received from our UKIP candidate. I was only out for a few hours but when I came back I heared of yet another reason, far more serious, for not voting UKIP on May 2nd.

One of their candidates in Sussex, Anna-Marie Crampton, has been told to stand down in the election, although her name will still be on the ballot paper, for alleged anti-Semitic remarks regarding the Holocaust. It seems she has also urged people to read 'The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion', a pretty vile hoax written around 1900 by Russian anti-Semites to justify their anti-Semitism. The story is covered in the Jewish Chronicle Online.

The problem with UKIP is that despite an army of staff, funded by their MEPs, they don't seem to use those resources to vet their candidates. Or maybe they just hope the more 'eccentric' ones will be able to survive a campaign without coming out with something embarrassing at best, utterly damning at worst.

Part of the problem is that the amount of coverage a party gets during an election campaign, such as the number of election broadcasts they are allocated, depends on the number of candidates they have. So pressure is put on branches to find candidates, at all costs, so an occasional nutter slips through the net. But it's hard to blame it on that when the photograph of a shamed candidate with her party leader is all over the internet.

UKIP is riddled with people who believe in conspiracy theories, especially Common Purpose and the New World Order. The problem is that people like Anna-Marie Crampton are exposed every now and then, as are other 'eccentrics' in UKIP, but what if the one that flies under the radar gets elected?

More on this story from The Brighton Argus.

UKIP-County Council Elections May 2nd

Nigel Farage-serious politician?

This week I had a UKIP election leaflet popped through the letterbox. I've now had Tory, Labour and UKIP election material. Comparing the three it is quite obvious why people who claim to be voting UKIP to pollsters don't actually vote for them when the real election comes around. To say the UKIP leaflet is amateurish would be an understatement. It is like a fourth formers first effort in the school mock election.

For a start it is only A5, and one side of that is blank. What a waste of space. But I suppose as the party has gone native squandering EU funds like that is now par for the course. But here is the start of the message from the candidate:

"I have decided to stand in this election for UKIP as I am sick of Conservative, Lib Dem and Labour local politicians taking me and my vote for granted and offering nothing in return, preferring to follow orders from their masters in Westminster."

Oh the irony. UKIP's masters sit in the EU parliament, including leader Nigel Farage whose grip on the party makes Stalin's grip on the USSR look tenuous. The party exists merely to keep their MEPs and their staff on the gravy train, hence the lack of serious effort in these UK elections. Just compare their literature this year with the standard they will produce for next year's gravy train elections. But the next paragraph on the leaflet goes on:

"If elected I will never follow a party line to the detriment of our area. I promise to represent your views and will always put our community first."

Well then, tell that to Nikki Sinclaire MEP. Nikki refused to sit with the UKIP group in the EU parliament because of the assorted homophobes, racists and other nutjobs in the group from various EU countries. Nikki was promptly expelled from the party and now sits as an independent MEP for the West Midlands. More on Nikki's treatment by UKIP here.

He then continues:

"Common sense solutions for a Britain independent, free and fair."

There is no explanation as to what the candidate or UKIP's idea of 'commonsense' is or what they mean by 'fair' or 'free'. Just empty rhetoric that means absolutely nothing. But there's more. The leaflet goes on:

"UKIP is a patriotic party that believes in putting people first. To shore up the collapsing Euro and (I think that should be 'the' rather than 'and') EU is now seeking to pull away the props of our national economy-control over taxation and spending.

Only UKIP will give the power to the British people to regain self-government."

Interesting to look at a few of the words in this little offering, or rather a few of the words not in this little offering.

Although the head of the leaflet carries the sentence 'County Council Election' the name of the county isn't mentioned once. It is actually Lancashire County Council.

County Hall is in Preston. This isn't mentioned once but Westminster pops up. As does the Euro and the EU.

Mention is made of the EU taking control from Westminster over taxation and spending. Not once has a service provided by Lancashire County Council been mentioned, let alone a UKIP policy at that level.

Any party that can produce an election leaflet that fails to mention one single policy, that fails to mention one single service that the county council provides and fails to even mention the name of the authority for which the candidate is standing, deserves a sound thrashing on May 2nd.