On the face of it, UKIP's pledge of no more immigration for five years is a vote winner. Immigration is constantly up there as one of the issues people are most concerned about. UKIP say they need a five year moratorium in order to have time to work out an Australian style points system. All I can say is that they must have some very dim policy makers if it takes them five years. In actual fact, this points system is already Tory policy. So guys, come on. If you're serious and want to introduce that policy, come and join the party who might actually be in a position to implement it.
Nigel Farage is at least honest about his own prospects. He says UKIP are not ready for an election, they haven't got the money to fight one properly and haven't got enough candidates. A helpful suggestion. Sit this one out.
They won't, of course, because they are far more interested in damaging the Conservative Party than helping to eject one of the most discredited governments in modern British history. UKIP don't want Britain to sign up to the new EU Constitution. Nor does the Conservative Party. Has it ever ocurred to them that if they didn't fight Tory candidates in marginal seats there might just be the prospect of a Tory government holding a referendum and then vetoing the constitution? No, because they're too blinkered to see the wood from the trees.
UPDATE: You see Farage's speech HERE. On the Democracy Forum Anthony Butcher (who I think was a UKIP leadership contender) says "notice that he repeatedly says "didn't they?", "aren't we?", "don't we?", "isn't it?" "ladies and gentlemen" etc. It gets a bit annoying after a while. Is this nerves? He certainly doesn't sound as slick as he used to." Suits you, sir.
23 comments:
one of the most discredited governments in modern British history
that's being far too kind to the Nulab scum.
You are right that Nigel was excellent at conference yesterday. However, we can't take your advice to sit this one out because there is in fact precious little to choose between the the pro-EU parties and a huge need to fight for nation-based democracy.
Interesting, isn't it, that you could replace UKIP in the above with the initials of a neo-Nazi party we all know and it would still be true. Tells you a lot about the Tories.
I always warn against the arguement that UKIP lose us seats, because there's nothing very helpful that can come of it. My own experience is that Associations in this scenario tend to try to head off UKIP, and in doing so they take their eye off the main prize and lose more votes to Labour and the Lib Dems than they can ever gain from UKIP.
In other words 'don't split the tory vote says tory'.
You haven't got what it takes to win UKIP voters so you'd rather they did the job for you. Lazy.
Its sensible in my opinion and is better than McLabours immigration Policy of:
"Get as many immigrants into England as we can because they will vote McLabour".
Unless and until we have a firm committment from Cameron, not just for a referendum, but to refuse to sign up to the treaty or any future Euro constitution then UKIP will continue to be able to claim the genuinely eurosceptic ground as their own. Cameron has a track record of sounding anti federalist in order to secure support and then backtracking on that promise (the EPP debacle & his protection of europhile MEPs)and so it is difficult to trust him on this, the most important of issues.
UKIP could do a clever move and save their party funds and sit this one out.
Anything else would be supporting the federalist Gordon Brown.
All Cameron has to do is say "We will hold a referendum on the EU treaty. If the referendum provides a 'no' vote, we will run a further referendum on EU membership.
That would be the end of UKIP as a meaningul political force and would bring in a lot more eursosceptic activists to help the Tories.
Even the europhile Tories will have a hard time complaining about a referendum on EU membership.
You, or rather the Tories, will not get my vote by denigrating UKIP. Rather nutty and disorganised that they are is agreed, but they have the guts to announce something which could be a step in the right direction. The Cameron squad seem too frightened of their own shadow to tackle the subject meaningfully.
The government are discredited in your opinion only.
If they are re-elected, does the Tory spin version of reality hold, or not?
Of course the Major administration takes the biscuit as the most discredited government of the modern era. But you won't mention that, will you.
Anonymousd 1:28 "Interesting, isn't it, that you could replace UKIP in the above with the initials of a neo-Nazi party we all know...".
No. Not really. But then, other people's King Charles's heads are never that rivetting.
Dave is a federalist. He wants his feet under the top table. He is not anti-EU.
PS - I keep asking and no one answers: can immigrants vote in our country? You don't even have to be a citizen to vote?
I doubt UKIP will contest those labour marginals where a strong 'sceptic conservative ppc is standing.
So it's up to those conservative ppc's to make damn well sure they put Europe at the top of their campaigning list, isn't it?
My understanding is:
a) that you must be a UK citizen in order to register to vote in parliamentary elections.
b) that EU citizens resident in the UK can register to vote in European as well as local elections. I am not sure if you must have been resident for a certain period before this right can be enjoyed.
I'm entirely symapthetic to the need for the Tories to eject the current shower, but the debate on immigration is puerile.
Only immigrants from outside the EU could be subjected to the Australian type limits that seem to be this month's flavour, so there is no way that anyone is going to be able to limit the flow for the vast majority of immigration to the UK.
As far as immigrants from outside the EU are concerned, they will continue to arrive here, illegally, claiming Political Asylum, or having spent a qualifying period in another EU state.
You only have to look at football where Premiership (Arsenal, Man U)clubs have been setting up collaborative arrangements with Belgian clubs so that they can import promising youngsters from Africa and get the Belgian authorities to issue their work permits so that they can come over here perfectly legally, and there's really damn-all we can do about it.
The whole set-up is squalid and politicians who claim to be able to implement a quick-fix at the national level do the whole political system a disservice.
Verity,
About the voting. If you are an EU citizen you can vote in local and European elections but not general. If you are from outside the EU you cannot vote until you are British. Does that answer your question?
On the subject of the Conservatives being against the "Constitution for Europe" now knowns as the "Reform Treaty", I actually have not heard any leading Tory say so. They are for a referendum. But how the party will campaign if there is one is, at this stage, anybody's guess.
Iain,
I am aware from comments that you made on 18 Doughty Street a couple of months ago that you are sceptical about the merits of electoral reform and/or some form of PR for Westminster.
Do you not think perhaps that the fact that UKIP can cause the Tories to lose seats in marginal constituencies underlines the need for some sort of change to the electoral system? It seems a bit unfair for you to want them to withdraw altogether from an election effectively leaving its supporters and those who are sympathetic to its aims disenfranchised. Just because the Conservatives may be much closer to UKIP’s aims than say Labour or the Lib Dems is not justification for removing them as an option.
However under our current First Past the Post system UKIP have no chance of getting any seats, even though at the 2005 election they gained 2.2% of the vote which should entitle them in a properly proportional system to about 13 seats.
I agree that it is a perverse outcome in say a Tory/Lib Dem marginal where the UKIP vote effectively hands the seat to the Lib Dems and where this was not the desire of the UKIP voters. However getting UKIP not to stand is not the answer. A more representative voting system is.
Nigel Farage's wife is German. I wonder if she would be excluded from the UK and whether she is considered a "drain on public services".
The Useful Kind Of idiots
"Cameron has a track record of sounding anti federalist in order to secure support and then backtracking"
Well said! The Tories simply cannot be trusted on Europe. They've repeatedly sold us out before while mouthing sceptical rhetoric - and that's under a far better leader than "Dave".
We've seen the wood and it's quite rotten thanks!
http://www.ukip.tv/?page_id=2
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