Andrew Constantine

Martin

You are perfectly entiltled to your views, to which I would like to reply as follows.

Trying to be objective, my assumption is that in all future elections in England (except those for the European elections), the English Democrats are likely do better per candidate than UKIP's. Indeed in the recent local elections, where both UKIP and English Democrats were standing, UKIP lost more often to us than vice versa.

The above is the trend and I see no obvious factor that will break this trend.

The position on European elections is harder to call. UKIP have a past record here which has both pros and cons. Does the fact that UKIP have been the longest running anti-EU party, plus Mr Farage's media abilities and the fact of your existing MEPs outweigh the baggage? I do not know the answer: the results of the Euro elections in May 2009 will tell us.

You will now see where I am coming from in some of my posts on this forum. On the one hand, UKIP have both more members and - with their existing MEPs - should have more cash resources. Yet the party has considerable baggage, an out of date image and some funny behaviours seem to be on show at the higher management levels.

Compare now the English Democrats: they have real appeal on the street in England and for a number of reasons. They have very able leadership and carry no baggage.

Put the two together - as in UKIP members move to us - and we could together have a very powerful political party that might win some key elections. The English Democrats party strategy of seeking an English Parliament is about both something we want in itself - and we think is the best means of getting out of the EU.

You will no doubt suggest the alternative option: of English Democrat members joining UKIP. I really do not think this would give the best result. It would not solve the UKIP baggage and behavioural problems. After all how many years has UKIP being around? What have you achieved in those years: possibly, the promose of a referendum on the Euro. Not much else.

In sum, UKIP seems to be going nowhere, both generally and in elections. Why reinforce failure? I simply do not see UKIP having much credibility or appeal on the street in England. Do you?

I finish with a short example of why the English Democrats are feeling confident about future success. In the recent local elections, we found that many people would come up to us in the street and ask for our literature. Was that your experience with UKIP's leaflets?

At the end of the day, we who favour democracy should be fighting on the same side against the EU. The question for us all is: How do we get there?

Andrew Constantine

C_steam

Anyway, regardless, printing the whole letter does prove the fact - which in this case can hardly be malicious misrepresentation!

fact is that Knapman and Farage had fallen out some time ago. This is just a shot in another petty UKIP ego-war.

Martin Harvey

Andrew Constantine wrote;
'Trying to be objective, my assumption is that in all future elections in England (except those for the European elections), the English Democrats are likely do better per candidate than UKIP's. Indeed in the recent local elections, where both UKIP and English Democrats were standing, UKIP lost more often to us than vice versa. '

He then goes on making further mis-leading innaccuracies re UKIP's election performance.
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The facts speak for themselves,
UKIP fielded over 1,000 candidates in this month's local elections. The EDs managed to field 78.
The UKIP vote increased percentage-wise overall.
The EDs beat UKIP on only 7 occassions, over the whole Country.

In the East UKIP fielded 98 candidates in the District Council elections, and the best result was a vote of over 38%
The best result in the East for the very few ED candidates was 31% achieved by the campaigning efforts of the ex UKIP MULTILOYALTY Bennett and Lee team.

O and by the way UKIP now has ten Town and Parish Councillors in the East alone. UKIP is on the up and up.

Martin Harvey.

Tony Bennett

Rodney Atkinson has launched this fierce attack on UKIP's leadership on his 'Freenations' website:

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FARAGE’S UKIP EMBRACES EUROFEDERALISM’S SUBSIDIARITY

Rodney Atkinson

The former leader of the UK Independence Party, Roger Knapman, has rightly attacked the present leader Nigel Farage (both are MEPs) for signing up UKIP to the EU’s (eurofederalist) idea of “subsidiarity”. Nothing could be more dangerous for a party which claims at least to believe in democratic national sovereignty.

Having come within a few votes of winning the UKIP leadership election of 2000, one of the many reasons why I was happy to leave was the evident impossibility (in a party bereft of credible leadership and intellect) of persuading anyone of any real political substance to join and persuade the electorate that we were capable of joining other parties in a sovereignty coalition in Parliament.

Nigel Farage was by no means the only barrier to such credibility but his lack of intellectual rigour was always going to be a major stumbling block.

Today we see why. Farage has never maintained a UKIP principle if he was offered financial incentives to abandon it. Thus when Paul Sykes offered millions of pounds the party effectively abandoned its objective of “gaining power to withdraw from the European Union” and instead said that they would adopt the methods of the other spineless euro-federalist parties and merely “hold a referendum”.

Now Farage and many of his UKIP colleagues in the European Parliament - in order to absorb another vaguely euro-sceptic party from Romania into their “Independence/Democracy Group” in the European Parliament - have embraced the dangerous eurofederalist principle of “subsidiarity”.

This, Farage maintains, is "UKIP (voting) for things if they reduce power at the centre.”

Subsidiarity is of course nothing of the sort. Far from ceding powers, subsidiarity is the means by which the central sovereign authority (the European Union) maintains its control. It hands down responsibilities not power. It decides what can be handed down to “lower” levels - like the nation states! - and it decides how many responsibilities are passed on.

Indeed by passing down responsibilities to the subservient nation states the cCentre saves money. It means the nation states have the burden of administration and have to raise the unpopular taxes – the centre, having passed on responsibilities, will not be reducing its budget, of that we can be sure.

So anyone who supports “subsidiarity” is not only a fool but a dangerous fool. This latest surrender of principle by UKIP is of course (surprise, surprise!) in order to raise more money and privileges for their MEPs.
In aid of the same money grab UKIP has even changed its policy on the wasteful, disastrous Common Agricultural Policy – it now seeks to “reform it”!

Anyone see any euro pigs flying?

The Ind/Dem group signed the declaration because it hopes to recruit the Romanian Party Pin and its MEPs in order to keep its numbers high enough to continue to qualify as a "group". This qualifies them for a lot of money and facilities paid for by the EU Parliament.

Thanks to additional funding, the IndDem group, including UKIP, is going to move to new offices next month, but such benefits would disappear if enough of its MEPs were to split off.

Roger Knapman wrote in his letter on May 13:

"I, and a number of my colleagues, cannot in all conscience accept something which represents a major departure from what we believed to be UKIP's policy - withdrawal from the EU, a complete rejection of its authority (and subsidiarity) and rejection of the Common Agricultural Policy."

Well done Roger Knapman! But one good man does not a party make! If he cannot convince a substantial number of UKIP MEPs to leave the Ind Dem group on this matter of fundamental principle then UKIP is surely finished.

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P.S. Historical fact:

The term 'subsidiarity' was a term first coined by the Papacy. It was a principle devised to regulate decision-making in the Roman Catholic Church.

In practice, the concept of 'subsidiarity' involved determining how much power bishops and junior clerics were given by the Pope and his Cardinals - i.e. what was the area of discretion which bishops and lesser clerics could exercise.

A formula was eventually devised. The Pope and his Cardinals decided that 'subsidiarity' meant that they could pick and choose what powers they would exercise, and the bishops and other clergy could have what few powers were left.

A superb blueprint for the European Union.

And, come to think of it, quite an appropriate blueprint for the way UKIP is currently run, too - T.B.

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Populist Lee

Interesting post, Tony.

On the point about "holding a referendum".
I think that change of tune by UKIP for the 2001 General Election was the point at which I realised UKIP could never win.

I understand you co-wrote the 2001 Manifesto with Aidan Rankin.

Who instructed you to change the committment of immediate EU withdrawal to "holding a Referendum"?

Martin Harvey

The posting by Tony Bennett of Rodney Atkinson's statement is probably the best, and most poignant piece that has been seen on this website for a long time.
Indeed a form of subsidiarity is being operated in local government from the EERA down through both County and District Councils, and eventually to Parish Councils. In other words, quite simply, instead of proper democracy where the power is derived from the people and is directed upwards, in the EU scheme of things power at the top dictates what the lower layers are allowed to do.
Martin Harvey

Bluemerle

I am told that Roger Knapman leaked the letter himself. :shock:

I cannot forgive the leaders, Knapman, Farage and other MEPs who sat back after the success in the Euro Election, rested on their laurels and allowed the party to drift instead of seizing the moment and making it a household name. This, I believe, was done deliberately.

The MEPs got more than they had dared to hope, a nice fat salary and perks. MEPs like Clarke and Wise never believed they would be elected, but the Kilroy factor was the driving power behind the success, it was his appearances on TV pushing the name of UKIP which made the party so successful. The very public falling out was disgraceful and it is no wonder UKIP is regarded as a bit of a joke.

They missed their chance to make the Party a household name in 2004. There is still a need for a fourth Party but it won't be UKIP. UKIP is too tainted with infighting and corruption.

kernow

Who will it be, In your opinion :?:

Independent UKIP

Indeed, a very good question. A chunk of Plymouth UKIP defected to nothingness that I currently know about. If there is to be that party where is it today? I say that here as I have assumed Bluemerle is from the South West?

Independent UKIP

As Petrina in the other relevant topic quite rightly does not want to go round in circles I will also not do so.

I just ask a genuine question. If Witold Tomczak, for example, was the person who went to Romania and signed a piece of paper on behalf of Ind/Dem would all those currently condemning Derek Clark maintain their current position & have expressed it in the same strong terms? That might be so (or not!) but have I somehow also overlooked years worth of similar non-UKIP Ind/Dem statements?