For the past two or three weeks I have been subscribing to the Brexit Central newsletter, edited by Jonathan Isaby, former Chief Executive of the Taxpayers’ Alliance. Generally it is an interesting and informative digest of conservative mainstream media articles putting a positive spin on Brexit.
What I have also come to notice is its apparent determination not to mention, or give any credit whatsoever to, UKIP. As far as Jonathan Isaby and his friends at Brexit Central are concerned, UKIP doesn’t exist, and certainly made no contribution to winning the Brexit referendum. That, along with our ultimate divorce from the EU, is purely an achievement of the Eurosceptic Conservatives.
This came to a head one morning when I read the following excerpt in the newsletter:
Daniel Hannan MEP – “The man who brought you Brexit”:
“It was Hannan, in 2012, who asked Matthew Elliott, the founder of the Taxpayers’ Alliance, to set up the embryonic campaign group that later became Vote Leave. Elliott, who is 38, describes Hannan as the pamphleteer who made Brexit seem like a reasonable proposition for millions of people. “I can’t think of anybody who has done more on this,” he told me. Others laboured too, of course, and Elliott cited veteran Tory MPs Bill Cash and John Redwood, who spent decades attacking the constitutional and economic aspects of the EU – “but Dan is the only person who has successfully created a whole worldview,” he said. “And also has done better than anyone else to be the propagandist for it.”
OK, the above is a quote from a Guardian article, but it is consistent with the attempt to totally airbrush UKIP from the Brexit story.
One person immediately springs to mind who certainly did more to promote Brexit and win the referendum than Daniel Whatshisname – along with a whole party, with its elected MEPs and thousands of grassroots activists up and down the country.
This avoidance of crediting Nigel Farage and UKIP for their contribution to delivering Brexit is not just a tedious perpetuation on the Vote Leave/Leave.EU feud. It’s a surreal re-writing of history. If it hadn’t been for UKIP winning 4 million votes in the 2015 General Election, forcing Cameron to hold a referendum, and Farage’s ability to communicate with ordinary voters, Euroscepticism would still be inhabiting the eccentric fringes of the Tory party, as it had done for 25 years.
Oh, now I notice that Brexit Central does acknowledge one UKIPper – it has a link to Douglas Carswell’s blog further down the page. That in itself is somewhat telling.
Personally, though I would have preferred Grassroots Out to have got the nomination, I readily got involved in Vote Leave and was happy to work with a range of like-minded people to achieve our common goal.
I find it depressing that UKIP, and the wider Brexit movement, continues to be riven by feuding between factions and the egos of leading figures and donors.
UKIP itself has a long way to go before these divisions are behind us. For my part I will put my profound disappointment that the party elected Diane James as leader aside, to give her a chance to heal the wounds in the party, which Paul Nuttall so eloquently and passionately articulated at Conference was necessary. I have to say she did not get off to an auspicious start. Her leadership campaign was a two-finger gesture to the NEC, refusing to take part in the hustings process, and one of her first acts as leader was to change the conference running order to prevent the other leadership candidates addressing conference from the podium and to replace Neil Hamilton with Nathan Gill – the man the other Welsh UKIP AMs have rejected to the point that he now sits as an independent. They don’t even mention him in their communications.
The one person James made a very public show of building bridges with was Douglas Carswell.
I would find this easier to accept if factional differences were clearly driven by differences in policy or focus, and I could identify with one or other in particular. Unfortunately these divisions seem to be driven by egos and cronyism. While I regard Nigel Farage as a hero and genius orator who has done more than anyone to achieve Brexit and change the course of this country’s history, from those I have spoken with, I know how his behaviour behind the scenes has been divisive. While I am embarrassed to be in the same party as Neil “Cash-for-Questions” Hamilton, I understand how some AMs find themselves unable to work with Nathan Gill in the wake of how the Welsh selection process was conducted earlier this year.
Sadly, the egos and feuds of key individuals getting in the way of the cause we are supposed to be working towards is par for the course in politics, It has ever been thus. That’s why the word “politics” is used a euphemism for unconstructive office infighting. UKIP is not a new kind of politics in that respect!
I just hope we can all focus on holding the government’s feet to the fire to honour the democratic mandate to deliver “clean Brexit” (as Jonathan Isaby calls it) and take back control of our borders, rather than fighting among ourselves.
That, however, is a two-year job.
Brexit we can all agree on. What after that? Does UKIP even have a role? That is perhaps when these divisions really do become relevant.
The Eurosceptic Tories don’t want UKIP threatening the status quo. To them (and some UKIPpers) Brexit is purely about free markets and freeing business from regulation which stands in the way of them making more money. To win the referendum however (and though many in Vote Leave resisted it) they had to appeal to the provincial working class by raising the subject of immigration. That particular genie is now out of the bottle. Those voters will no longer be satisfied by government policies being pursued in the sole interest of the metropolitan moneyed elite.
And that, dear reader, is the subject of another article…
Paul, That`s all fine and I agree with the sentiments.
The only problem is that except for the “inside few” and perhaps one or two on the periphery of these individuals; I and I guess many of the foot soldiers, who have been bemused, annoyed, astonished, alienated, worried, curious; have not been party to understanding exactly what the problems have been that have led to such obvious dissention and even enmity in what should have been a cohesive and fully functioning party.
If you want a comparison UKIP seems to run like a car with a continually misfiring engine. I don`t wonder that not all voters are very enthusiastic about dabbling in our brand of political vehicle.
I know I/we will never have a full account of all the “comings and goings” of the previous management and “directors” and I would love to think that we have had a healing conference and everything from now on will be rosy.
However, I do want to be satisfied that all previous rivalries and just plain doubts about policy are buried and previous protagonists have recanted enough to allow proper burial of the past.
If we are to be an effective force, equipped to fill this “democratic parliamentary political vacuum” in which we claim to be the sole uncontaminated party representing 17.4million mostly grass root escapees; then we cannot allow ourselves to be infected from within by those who may have a different or indeed personal agenda from that of our leader Diane James.
PS Diane is not in the same position as St.Theresa who is “negotiating” and keeping her cards close to her body. Diane must be completely open with the membership and the electorate as to her plans and policies and methods of implementing them – this is in addition to only an outline our “Objectives”.
We have to be able to “buy into her plan (product)” to be able to sell it as her enthusiastic sales team.
If we are not galvanised from within, we certainly cannot expect to be swamped by takers from without.
No doubt it’s down to cost but I wish there was an edit facility on this site, it’s hard to proof read when you can’t see all the text in one go !
I have strong feelings about the way in which some of our old leadership and elected representatives have clearly put personal opinions and interests before the party, and thus the nation.
However, we have a new leader now, the period of office politics should be over and all Ukipers must support Diane, at least in public. No more briefing against each other. Should there be some honest difference of opinion on policy, we must accept the view of the ruling body and leader or put the question to the membership, then live with the result.
THERE WILL BE ONLY ONE CHANCE and that’s right now, to show the electorate that our party is far more than a protest group that has served it’s purpose, especially as the establishment will work hard towards convincing the public that our job is done.
As a nation, at this critical time in our history, we desperately need ordinary people to have a voice in how we move forward and UKIP are the only party that can do this job. I guess we are all individualists with strong convictions or we would not be in Ukipers but we can best serve our country now by biting our tongues, understanding that no party can ever please all it’s members all the time and seizing this one opportunity to make serious inroads into the political stitch up that has governed the UK for the past 100 years odd.
It would be tragic if differences within the party prevent us in making a true breakthrough under the FPTP system and we start this process now, by campaigning in the May local elections.
Steven Woolfe came over as very impressive on last weeks Question Time, let’s have more of that from all the senior people in the party and no more cracks in the united front we need to win.
I am hoping that UKIP post Brexit (if ever) will be able to position itself as the party that will fight for British interests and represent the people of Great Britain. No party currently does this. We are constantly being lectured by Lib/Lab/Con how caring we should be towards the whole world, but no-one seems to care about Brits that need things too. Our elderly are being shamefully neglected, our Armed Forces similarly. Young people – too many issues to list them, but you get my drift. So many people rightly feel that no-one cares about them. I hope that UKIP will be, post Brexit, the Party of and for Great Britain.
I like that Dee.
We are also the natural “unity” party with which 17.4 million voters can identify as the only authentic dedicated organisation (when it gets its act together) who represented enthusiastically their desire to step out into the world and make Britain great again.
The other legacy parties, not only don`t deserve any plaudits, but deep down they are still recidivists and are still plagued by their xenophobic remain instincts and covered in guilt of the truly negative and uncalled for campaign they so enthusiastically took part in and are still contributing to the atmosphere of dissent which still pervades the Westminster body politic and the MSM and the institutions and pliant world dignitaries they enlisted.
To hell with them, what a load of drags.
Hi Phil
There’s nothing legally stopping Nathan Gill stiitng as both an AM and an MEP.
Here’s a link to an article in Wales Online “Two jobs Nathan Gill is to become an Independent AM – while remaining a Ukip MEP” http://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/politics/two-jobs-nathan-gill-become-11760815 which describes the situation quite well, except the ballot of party members on whether he should be allowed to keep both of his elected roles has not happened (surprise, surprise!).
Depressing to read the rewriting of history in the above article.
However what they are doing is only a draft version and the real story is too well known to not become the orthodox view of events.
Having stated that I must say that sometimes the lies triumph for very long periods viz Katyn Forest and the conduct of the Bolsheviks in Ukraine where 7 million natives were massmurdered in the Holodomyr.
Not to mention ( ok I am mentioning it) the mass mudrer of possibly 5 million ethnic German civilians by the Red Army etc 1944-48.
Lies dominated at the Nuremberg trials where Bolshevik gangsters wore judges robes and despatched some innocent men to their graves.
They say the winners write history. Also that he who does not learn the lessons of history is doomed to repeat it – as we move into a period of censorship and ideology permeating academia which starts to resemble the Soviet era.
If the article in the link below, which appeared on Breitbart yesterday, is anything to go by, it’s going to get worse before it gets better.
http://www.breitbart.com/london/2016/09/30/historian-islam-demonise-christians/
You say: “Nathan Gill – the man the other Welsh UKIP Ams have rejected to the point that he now sits as an independent.” I was under the impression he was not allowed to sit both as an AM and as an MEP, so remained an MEP. Can you clarify, please?