Toby on Tuesday
‘Less European?…’
There have been some wonderful lies cooked up by the
Eurofanatics who have caused such havoc to our country during the past
generation. The most lurid of course is the old threat that, if
Britain left the EU, somehow 3 million jobs would instantly disappear.
This presumes that all trade with the EU would cease overnight, even
though we import infinitely more from the rest of the EU than they buy
from us and they would be desperate for a trade agreement. Of course
this was the mantra of the late Nick Clegg and his now departed, if not
regretted, LibDem friends. But perhaps the most colourful is the claim
that Britain would, after Brexit, somehow cease to be European and
therefore could no longer take part in the high camp annual ritual of
the Eurovision Song Contest.
I chuckled over this to myself last week when I read through the list
of Eurovision contestants. 40 nations entered of which only 28 were
actual EU members and just 19 were trapped in the downward spiral of the
doomed Euro currency. So over half the nations entering Eurovision do
not actually use the Euro and they are the ones likely to survive the
existential crisis caused by this doomed project. Iceland, Norway,
Switzerland, which wisely stayed outside the EU in the 1970’s, do not
see themselves as any less “European” for having escaped its clutches,
while the entries also included Armenia, from where Kim Kardashian’s
family come and whose genocide at the hands of the Turks in the 1920’s
is only now being acknowledged, Israel, Russia and even Australia! In
fact of the first five winning entries, only three (Sweden, Italy and
Belgium) are even in the EU and only two (Italy and Belgium) actually
use the Euro currency. So UKIP’s claim to love Europe and European
culture while detesting the EU and all its works is well-founded when
you see the Eurovision line-up.
And for those trapped inside the prison of the Euro currency, with
all its dreadful consequences, their songs sounded like cries for help.
The beautiful Maria Elena Kyriakou stunned us all with her voice and
the words of her song,
“I’m begging you take me
out of this firing hell
Come back and save me -
What happened wasn’t fair.
Nothing left. All that I have
is one last breath.
Only one last breath!”
If that isn’t a cry for help from a suffering country martyred by
Euro membership, I don’t know what is. In truth, Eurovision is a
wonderful image of what the future of the Continent could look like. A
shared civilisation, stretching (in David Cameron’s words) from the
Atlantic to the Urals, without the failing grip of the so-called
“European Union”, but including Russia, even Israel and with strong ties
to Britain’s own Commonwealth – Australia and the rest – on which Ted
Heath so foolishly turned his back in 1972. This is the great prize
that UKIP is seeking as work starts on our In/Out referendum. On
Saturday, the UK’s entry finished 24th. Who knows, if we ultimately
left the EU we might even, like Russia and Australia, find ourselves in
the top five!
Until next Tuesday!
Toby
Toby on Tuesday
'And the dust settles…'
If, as they say, there is no such thing as bad publicity, then
UKIP has had a truly wonderful ten days since the General Election.
With nearly 4 million votes in the bag, the commitment to an in/out EU
referendum from the Government, the most professional of all the
parties’ manifestos, 120 second places and an outstanding elected MP in
Douglas Carswell, there is much to celebrate. There is also much to
build on if wise heads are allowed to prevail. As William Hague’s
Constituency Chairman in Richmond during his leadership of the
Conservative Party, I well remember turmoil and in-fighting in a
disappointed party. Yet the Conservative Party in 1997 had suffered a
devastating setback from which it has only just recovered 18 years
later. UKIP in 2015 has enjoyed an astonishing advance and, when the
dust settles, its full extent will become clear.
What is also clear is that the Government is now determined to rush
through the EU referendum with no Treaty amendments and only cosmetic
changes to certain welfare and other benefits. The existential
questions of border controls, the security implications of Turkish
accession, the Common Fisheries Policy (once a Conservative priority),
financial contagion as the Eurozone plunges into recession, will simply
not get a mention. No doubt the EU itself will help fund the “In”
campaign and every trick in the book will be used to ensure its success.
It is to these great issues that all UKIP’s energies must be focussed
in the coming months.
And the reality is that in Nigel Farage we have most effective
Eurorealist campaigner of our time and in Douglas Carswell the most
original and creative Parliamentarian. As well as these two, we have
outstanding MEP’s in our own Jane Collins and Mike Hookem, in Paul
Nuttall our Deputy Leader, in Stephen Woolfe, in William Dartmouth and
many more, and we have the truly excellent Suzanne Evans, who did such a
superb job with our manifesto, and many others. The simple
frustration of finding ourselves under first-past-the-post with so many
votes for just one MP is understandable, but once the dust settles the
sheer scale of our achievement on 7th May will become clear. We can
then regroup and go forward to fight a staged referendum on EU
membership, led by Nigel and our MEP’s across the country and, in
Parliament itself, by Douglas Carswell, on whom great responsibility now
rests. They will have the support of all our members in this, the
country’s greatest challenge of our time!
Until next Tuesday!
Toby
Toby on Tuesday
Thank you, 7805 times.
First the numbers. In Britain as a whole, UKIP won nearly 4
million votes, around 13% of the total share. In England alone, the
percentage was nearer 17%. Here in Thirsk and Malton, our vote soared
from 2,502 in 2010 to 7,805 (15%), against 27,545 votes (53%) for the
Conservatives and 8,089 (15.5%) for Labour. We also had fine results
for our excellent local candidates, Janine Robinson, Kevin Anderson,
Peter Ash, Chris Cooper, Trevor Golding, Philip Mooring and Barry Waite.
In terms of votes, UKIP is now clearly the country’s third largest
political party and even if that did not translate into seats won, we
gained a great moral victory.
Next, the thanks. A huge thank you to the whole UKIP Thirsk and
Malton team, who should be immensely proud to have achieved so much with
such limited resources. Our team has true star quality and to Emma,
Janine, Dave, Eric and all involved in the campaign I offer my heartfelt
gratitude. UKIP should be immensely proud of your truly superb
contribution to the great cause of regaining our nation and our
democracy.
Finally, the future. Of course, UKIP’s greatest achievement has
been to force our Prime Minister to concede a referendum in 2017 on
Britain’s membership of the European Union. Legislation to provide for
this should be enacted later this year. And over the coming months,
the terms of Britain’s membership of the whole project will be reviewed
with the European Commission. UKIP’s task will be to present a
positive picture of a Britain released from the tentacles of this doomed
venture. On the morning after polling day, I spoke to my old friend
William Dartmouth MEP, UKIP’s Trade Spokesman, who told me that he was
rewriting his “Out of Europe – Into the World”, a compelling account of
how our economy would benefit from EU exit. And we need to use our new
strength to increase pressure on the Conservative Party to up the terms
of its renegotiation strategy, not forgetting that when Michael Howard
was its leader, repatriation of the truly appalling Common Fisheries
Policy was a Conservative objective, an undertaking that was quietly and
characteristically dropped by David Cameron. If we were to recover
our 200-mile fishing limit again, it would underscore the truth that we
are a maritime, trading nation and not just one more colony of a failing
Continental state.
So we have much to be proud of. In particular, we should be proud
of the manifesto on which we fought the General Election. This was the
best of all the manifestos and the only one independently audited and
verified. In great measure, it was the work of Suzanne Evans, UKIP’s
excellent Deputy Chairman, and for my part it will be my bible in the
years ahead. So congratulations and thanks to all involved in our
campaign. Now let’s brace ourselves for the challenges that we face
and ensure that in 2017 under UKIP’s inspirational leadership, both past
and future, Britain can become a sovereign and independent nation once
more, looking confidently out to the wider World!
Until next Tuesday!
Toby
Toby on Tuesday
'Inequitable Life'
7.00pm this evening will see the very last public event of our
campaign when we hold our pre-Eve of Poll Meeting at Malton’s Milton
Rooms. Let’s hope for a good turnout for a vintage occasion at which
everyone, including the Press, will be welcome. We can all celebrate
the birth of our new Princess, have a traditional election speech and,
all being well, some lively questions. With the help of our truly
superb UKIP Thirsk and Malton team, what I have tried to do all through
this campaign is to combine the new social media, like this blog and our
website, with very traditional electioneering, speaking at countless
hustings and actually meeting and talking to people.
High points of the past few days have included visits to Malton’s
Jack Berry House, an astonishing new facility for injured jockeys and
the wider Malton community, inspired by the legendary racehorse trainer,
Jack Berry, to a centre in Easingwold enabling the severely disabled to
enjoy productive work run by the inspirational Mark Johnson, to Colin
Badgery’s fascinating Thirsk Birds of Prey Centre, among the
constituency’s most remarkable visitor attractions, and of course last
Wednesday to Leeds Arena for BBC1’s Yorkshire television debate.
But the meeting that has in many ways made the deepest impression, as
evidence of the cynical way in which we are governed, has been with the
representatives of the Equitable Life Assurance Society’s policy
holders. As a direct result of Government maladministration, they have
effectively had a total of some £2.8 billion stolen from their
pensions. The background to this is that, despite holding some £26
billion of savers’ funds, the Society, like the banks, had accumulated
immense unhedged liabilities that it was unable to meet. In 2000, it
closed to new business and slashed payouts to its million or so policy
holders, of whom several hundred live in the constituency. As the
regulator of the Society, the Treasury was directly responsible for this
fiasco but from the start was determined to evade responsibility.
A series of public enquiries and Parliamentary debates followed. In
July 2008 the Parliamentary ombudsman, Ann Abraham, published her
report in which the Treasury was found guilty of regulatory
maladministration. It also emerged that on “data protection grounds”
the Treasury had destroyed the details of 353,000 policy holders, rather
as in an entirely separate scandal potentially embarrassing files had
gone missing from the Home Office. At the 2010 Comprehensive Spending
Review, George Osborne accepted her finding that the total loss suffered
by the Society’s policy holders amounted to £4.3 billion. However,
due to “affordability constraints”, their compensation was limited to
£1.5 billion only, leaving the balance due of £2.8 billion in the greedy
hands of the Treasury.
The truth is that the Treasury saw the Society’s policy holders as
elderly, respectable people unlikely to make a fuss. They were not,
unlike the bankers who obtained 100% support from the Government, “too
big to fail”. By virtue of their being pensioners, time would in due
course take its toll and relieve the Treasury of its responsibilities.
They had been prudent, careful and thrifty and so could go hang in the
warped world of modern politics, where those who shout loudest and cause
most trouble actually prevail. I was pleased to be able to tell the
policy holders’ representatives that, if successful on 7th May, I would
take their cause to my heart and make it my own. But then we are
surrounded by instances of bad government – we will see this on a global
scale tomorrow when Greece, bankrupted by its membership of the Euro,
is due to pay a further $200 million to the IMF, a sum that it just does
not have. We must brace ourselves for the contagion that, as night
follows day, will surely occur throughout the Eurozone.
Perhaps the only wise decision made by our own politicians in the
past generation has been to keep the Pound and avoid the Euro. The
presence of UKIP has in large measure secured this policy and our
influence will only grow in the years ahead. And on Thursday, let’s
get the vote out and ensure that the whole constituency is painted
purple. So until next Tuesday, when we’ll know the result and there’ll
be a chance to thank our truly wonderful team at UKIP Thirsk and
Malton!
Until next Tuesday!
Toby
