B.A.Ware

This is really weird as Youthkip was set up by the Lechlade group and the leadership objected very strongly and set up UKIP Youth headed by Kate Davies only she did nothing.

Strange that isn't it :roll:

grahamj

Hi, I'm graham from London, aged 21, UKIP member and this is my first post!

I seem to share your experiences of a youth movement in UKIP: I was told when I joined (aged 17) that there wasn't a young members movement, but I was welcome to try and set one up! So I gave it a go, even gave a presentation to some major figures in UKIP at the time (e.g. the treasurer, John De Roeck and Damian Hockney), made a few contacts, even got something written in Independence News but partly due to A levels, partly due to lack of support from the leadership, I packed it in. It's very disappointing given that other smaller parties like the Greens and BNP have well established youth movements. I think the problem is just a lack of structure, and to set one up would presumably be like a major part time job! Of course, another major issue would be establishing who should do it, how to set up a committee, etc.

I think the best thing we can all do is collectively agree on one course of action, I suggest the following:

1. write to all 4 of the leadership candidates and ask them for their solutions to this issue i.e. 'Will you give your full support to a grass-roots led movement for young UKIP members, rather than a botched attempt forced from head office with little/no enthusiasm, and if so, how will you support it?' (I will happily do this if you indicate you would like me to do this). After all, there's no point doing anything if the new leader (whoever it is) attempts to crush it at birth. Once a new leader is in place, the following actions seem important: elect a leader and committee of UKIP youth (or whatever it is called) who is recognised by the main party leader and NEC and will actually get some support from them, they can then work on building maybe something like an e-newsletter or something really simple and cheap to build contacts up. Also, they should draw up a clear 'action plan' with the purpose of creating a sustainable and successful youth movement.

2. we need a record of any youth movements in UKIP currently going on, including student societies and access to their databases and any other info they have, to be honest I don't have a clue whether there currently is one single movement, or a spattering of small movements around the country. I'm assuming the 'official' UKIP Youth, run by Kate Davies is dead? If there are a handful of movements (which I suspect), they need to be 'amalgamated' somehow. At the very least, there needs to be a database of all 'willing and active' UKIP members under the age of say 30. I tried at 17 to get my hands on the national database of members and it was like trying to force a camel through the eye of a needle, I was told that the database didn't contain information on people's ages!

Any ideas, suggestions, comments reply here or e-mail me at g.j.pightling@lse.ac.uk. Cheers, Graham