UKIP crisis over “extremist views” of Euro allies

UKIP crisis over “extremist views” of Euro allies: http://is.gd/6c43n /via @leftfootfwd good, a UKIP crisis is always music to my ears

RT @leftfootfwd UKIP crisis over “extremist views” of Euro allies: http://is.gd/6c43n <- not only issue behind resignation of West Mids MEP?

Ha ha ha! UKIP's latest implosion is kicking off: RT @leftfootfwd: UKIP crisis over “extremist views” of Euro allies: http://is.gd/6c43n

RT @leftfootfwd: UKIP crisis over “extremist views” of Euro allies: http://is.gd/6c43n

I am a Social Research Masters student specialising in the field of comparative politics. In particular my specialist area is political parties in Europe, so I know a fair bit about UKIP’s allies.

The Danish People’s Party is self-admittedly anti-muslim. Their leader sued a Communist opponent for libel after being described as ‘racist’. The supreme court of Denmark found that she was indeed a racist. One of their MPs has compared Islam to fascism and the Qu’ran to Mein Kampf.

The Politically Reformed Group is a Dutch political party of a radical Christian Orthodox bent. It is so socially conservative that it does not accept the right of women to vote and only allows women within its party structure because the Dutch courts found that it had to.

The Slovak National Party is clearly racist, holding discriminatory views about Roma, Hungarians and Jews most clearly.

The Northern League in Italy is infamously xenophobic. A Northern League run city council in Italy recently banned kebab shops in the town centre, seemingly purely off a hatred of Turks.

I don’t know too much about the Lithuanian Order and Justice, but what I do know is not positive. It is worth noting that the Baltic states are not exactly what you’d call welcoming towards foreigners and ethnic minorities even in their mainstream politics, so if Order and Justice is considered outside the mainstream in Lithuania…

Movement for France is broadly comparable to UKIP itself. It is not the National Front but it is not exactly mainstream either.

And lastly there is True Finns, which I am also not too knowledgeable about (in this case, primarily because information is difficult to come by).

RT @Nosemonkey UKIP's latest implosion is kicking off: @leftfootfwd: UKIP crisis over “extremist views” of Euro allies: http://is.gd/6c43n

RT @leftfootfwd: UKIP crisis over “extremist views” of Euro allies: http://is.gd/6c43n

Ah, the True Finns. I’m a Brit living in Finland. My wife’s a civil right’s lawyer here. There was recently the conviction of Jussi Halla-Aho on charges of “defamation of religion” because of him blogging anti-muslim hate speech. Amazingly this racist wasn’t convicted of inciting racial haterd. The leader of the True Finns, Timo Soini is currently popular, he’s anti-immigration but claims not to be racist. On the other hand the true Finns really do have a lot of unreconstructed nazis who follow them.

BTW these problems for UKIP seem to be perennial. I assume they only get votes in EU elections because the vast majority of the population never pay any attention to the party at other times. People who are in general uncomfortable with the EU can express that feeling without actually voting in a party in Westminster that would take us out of Europe. Whatever anyone thinks, the vast majority of people don’t actually want to leave the EU do they?

I believe that the EU is a problem media wise as all we get are the negative and biased stories from the likes of The Mail/Express/Sun etc.

What Britain does need to do is work harder at relaying the positive messages and benefits that we have got from being members, why we should be more enthusiastic about the project (like lots of other EU states do) and not to be timid when to challenge the scaremongerers face on. Yes, of course there is a cost involved – that’s part of the deal – just like any other members’ club.

Writing that the media’s disinterest in the European Parliament is a good cause of the level of support for the UKIP. The BBC has permanent fibreoptic cables from Washington DC and New York so costing nothing to supply the ongoing US news narrative while Brussels and Strasbourg are just additional burdens to production budgets. It is both cheaper and what the viewers are used too and therefore prefer despite the almost zero effect on the UK of US politics and the extraordinary consequences of the business of the EU for us all. On this issue, and pretty much on this issue alone, the UKIP have a very strong position and we are ‘sleepwalking’ but then again, on this point even my MEP Claude Moraes would agree.

@Liz

“What Britain does need to do is work harder at relaying the positive messages and benefits that we have got from being members”

It might help if this so called “Labour” government hadn’t been so spineless in the face of the far-right UK press that is controlled by super rich capitalists who generally live abroad for tax purposes. We need proper competition in our media, that can’t happen when someone like Murdoch is allowed to own so many newspapers and television channels. They could have introduced proper media ownership laws when they came to power in 1997, but as usual they bottled it.

Alun – I couldn’t agree with you more re The Murdoch press and his wider media empire and our deference towards him.

Alun & Liz – I also agree. But how do we defeat the biased media empire of guys like Murdoch? Labour had 13 years to do it, so clearly we can’t wait for them to sort it out.

I think the growing fragmentation of media and changing ‘consumption’ of media might help to make some small & subtle changes. The growing number of blogs, citizen journalists and social media make for more interesting & empowering times. It’s a long road to furrow I know. Also the change in advertising strategy might also help dent the power of Murdoch etc.

Alun:
I’ve heard that most people do want to leave the EU, admittedly it’s only just over half, but it’s still a majority.

Liz:
I would agree with you that to stay in you need to show the benefits of the EU to the British people, but as far as I’ve looked into it, the ‘benefits’ are far outweighed by the negatives. Whether you like it or not, the only place the EU is going is a federal europe, and only a tiny percentage of the British public would be in favour of this.
And you all talk about biased media. We’re replying to a board called Left Foot Forward. Just sayin’…

Joe – YeI don’t think Britain has ever really had a proper & open discussion about the benefits of EU membership.. too timid to challenge the Murdoch press who have their own reasons for being anti-EU. If we did (and hopefully we will) then the British public might view things differently.

Federal Europe – not too sure about that – that is what a large part of the media would like us to believe. When people start talking about sovereignty via a vis Britain they seem to forget that countries such as France & Germany are also keen to protect their sovereignty – it’s not just a quaint old British thing.

Re LFF – at least it’s clear where it stands and what policies it supports.

Liz- I think that if there was an open discussion about EU membership there would be an even larger proportion of the public being Anti-EU, their reasons changing. I went to Strasbourg as open minded as possible, and came back wanting us to leave, and have a swiss-type relationship with the EU.
Also, Britain should have an open discussion on ‘EU membership’, not the ‘benefits of the EU’. It’s like me saying we should have a discussion on ‘The downsides to EU membership’.
There are a lot of Euro-myths out there, which are often used by the more ill-informed Eurosceptics, which leads you to believe all of us don’t know what we’re talking about, which is not the case, at all.
On the whole, British people are more protective of their country than the French, I think. In London you see very few EU flags whereas in Paris they’re almost always flown alongside the tri-colour. France does much better than we do out of the EU anyway, so it’s an unfair comparison.
LFF- Murdoch has clear ideologies, just like this site. UKIP is a right wing party, this is a Left wing site, so it’s going to be on the attack. Would you trust a review of the Lib Dems written by Daniel Hannan or a review of Labour policies written by the Torys?

Any attempt at a debate on the EU has been framed and tempered by the relentless, populist anti-Europe stories and eye catching headlines by the usual media suspects. So it has never been a level playing field to start with.

Re LFF etc – at least you know what are you getting, whereas lots of people who buy the Sun?/Mail/Express etc don’t realise the hidden (personal) agendas directing their news coverage. Anyway this is going off on a tangent.

I’ll admit to a certain bias here of course (for I’m a UKIP member and used to work for the party) but:

“Whatever anyone thinks, the vast majority of people don’t actually want to leave the EU do they?”

Well, we certainly think so. Which is why our major demand is that we ought to go and have a vote on it. A simple referendum. “Should the UK be in the EU or not?” would just about cover it.

You know, this democracy thing?

Same question for the UKDPP and the question being “Should the UK have the death penalty or not?”. Bar a state of emergency it is a silly and completely deadend misdirection that pulls the agenda rightwards. if we had a UKEFP (Euro-federal) campaigning for wider integration or a Tory Party not hiding a fundamental schism then UKIP would avid this definition. Bring on the rise of the One Nation/Liberal Party.

Joe

“I’ve heard that most people do want to leave the EU, admittedly it’s only just over half, but it’s still a majority.”

Where’s the evidence? I mean I’ve heard that the moonlandings were a hoax, but I don’t believe it. I’m not saying you’re wrong, just that you need to provide a bit more than hearsay.

Tim
“Well, we certainly think so. Which is why our major demand is that we ought to go and have a vote on it. A simple referendum. “Should the UK be in the EU or not?” would just about cover it.”

But the evidence doesn’t support your claim. I mean it’s all very well to say that we should have a referendum, but even in the EU elections last year UKIP got only 16.5% of the vote. That’s nowhere near a majority and hardly convincing. The problem with UKIP is that they are a single issue party, and most people just don’t feel that strongly about the EU. There’s a world of difference between wanting to leave the EU, and thinking this is an important issue. I’d bet that the vast majority of those who say they want to leave the EU also list it way down their list of priorities. UKIP’s members are bound to feel strongly about it, but that 16.5% must include a lot of people who would never dream of voting UKIP in a general election simply because the main issue in a general election is not EU membership, it is things like taxation, healthcare, education, war etc etc. Besides we actually did have a referendum on leaving didn’t we? I’m amazed people conveniently forget this, but the Labour Party held a referendum on the EEC (as it was then) back in 1975, and people voted to stay in by 67%, so a 2:1 majority in favour of remaining in the EU. Incidentally the Tories under Thatcher campaigned to stay in. On the other hand I’m not personally against another referendum on the EU, I’m in favour of staying in, but if leaving is really what the majority want then that’s democracy, right?

If I’m honest though I don’t believe we have had anything like a fair balanced examination of the UK’s place in the EU from our media for the last thirty years. Our media are controlled mainly by super rich capitalists who live abroad, they have no interest in the EU because it has such strict competition laws. So their far-right mouthpieces spout lies, propoganda and disinformation about the EU. Blair had the chance to put a stop to this but was a coward.

But that’s politicians (all politicians), they always work for the vested interests of those who bankroll them rather than the interests of the population.

Alun:
You contradicted yourself there. The question that the voters were asked was:
“Do you think the UK should stay in the European Community (Common Market)?”
I don’t know about you but I cant for the life of me see the the phrase European Union in the question. This may be because the ‘EU’ did not exist in 1973, but instead a very different being. Nobody in Britain under the age of 52 has had a chance to vote at all, and me being 19, I want a vote! I do commend you on your support of democracy though

And the evidence of over half wanting to leave the EU?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/the_daily_politics/7949104.stm

Your point about UKIP only getting 16.5% of the vote. Ukip is not the only party that comes across Eurosceptic. If you add together all the Eurosceptic party votes, thats the Conservatives, UKIP, no2eu, the BNP, United Kingdom First, The English Democrats, and so on, the figure is far far higher. Just adding the Tory’s, UKIP’s and the BNP’s votes together, that’s 49% already.
All out media is bias to some degree though! The BBC is bias, and does leave For all the anti-eu bias, there is pro-eu bias. The Guardian and the BBC are both pro-EU.

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