Happy New Year 2016

Well, 2015 has been a bit of a rollercoaster year for UKIP.

We've seen the party gain over 3.9m votes and end up with just one MP, no new UKIP peers were created despite Cameron promising to make Lords match votes, the SNP routed Labour in Scotland, the Lib Dems were virtually wiped out, Nigel Farage resigned as leader for the second time and was convinced to "unresign" by the party's executive and the campaign to leave the EU started in earnest.

2016 promises to be an even more exciting year for UKIP with political pundits putting their money on the EU referendum being held in the next 12 months. With immigration racing out of control and the EU knocking back Cameron's "demands" for renegotiation it's looking unlikely but if 2016 does turn out to be the year we finally got a say on membership of an EU superstate then we're ready to hit the ground running!

UKIP Derby steps in to carry out rubbish collections over Christmas

UKIPpers in Derby have collected over 300 bags of rubbish from households after Derby City Council cancelled Christmas refuse collections for the second year running.

The leader of the UKIP group in Derby, Cllr Alan Graves, received complaints from some residents that they would have to wait until at least 4th January before their Christmas rubbish was taken away and organised a group of volunteers to do the collections between Christmas and New Year.

Labour councillor, Paul Bayliss, dismissed UKIP's volunteering efforts as "daft" and said it was just a cynical ploy to attract votes. The next elections in the wards in question are in 2018 so there's very little electoral gain to be had this far in advance of an election. Cllr Bayliss was the leader of the council last year when Christmas waste collections were cancelled.

Over 100 households benefited from the UKIP's free waste collection this week.

Wiltshire Conservative councillor calls for private landlords to be taxed out of existence

A Conservative councillor has described private landlords as "parasites" that should be "taxed out of existence".

Wiltshire councillor, Chris Devine, made the astonishing remarks in response to an email from a lobbyist regarding the intended changes to private landlord tax exemptions that many in the industry believe will result in higher rents.

So Gareth, how many properties do you own?   Your email is deeply flawed, do you seriously believe that the `buy to let` brigade give a fig for those they are exploiting with high rents and short tenancies.

Stop thinking about your own pocket and think about society, you lot are nothing, but, parasites and the sooner you are taxed out of existence the better.

Just because I am a Conservative does not mean that I do not have a social conscience, well done to George Osbourne.  As for you. Try doing some public service and stop snivelling.

Chris Devine, Cllr

Cllr Devine has been reported to the Conservative group leader and the Chief Executive of Wiltshire Council.

Conservative leader of Worcestershire County Council charged with drink driving

The Conservative leader of Worcestershire County Council has been charged with drink driving.

Cllr Adrian Hardman was arrested on the 22nd and will appear before a magistrate on 18th January.

Cameron promises to "do something" about flooding except the EU won't let him

People in the north of England have been suffering from horrendous flooding this last few weeks with many in Yorkshire and Cumbria spending Christmas in leisure centres or with friends and relatives outside of flooded areas.

And as if the flooding wasn't bad enough, David Cameron has decided to inflict himself on the poor people of York with empty promises of looking at things and doing things better.

What Cameron fails to acknowledge, of course, is that there is nothing that he or the British government can do to prevent the flooding. Barriers aren't the answer, dredging is. For centuries we've dredged rivers and taken advantage of the reclaimed land for farming and building but that doesn't happen any more because the EU Water Framework Directive prohibits dredging of rivers and requires their "management" to reclaim historic flood plains.

There is very little that the British government can do to prevent flooding while we remain members of the EU.

Sorry chaps, we're not allowed to dredge the river so ... same time again next year, eh?

Happy Christmas

No polling cards in our stockings this morning but Santa always delivers ...

RadioFreeUK - Godfrey Bloom joins the line up, and the Facebook page is open for discussion.

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Now the whole programme is cross posted to Youtube too!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cKaPtlracG4&list=PL4Ya62dyEn0tCJi0eQGwbPSm1hv0RQu7g

The roll of regular contributors continues to grow and now includes...

Me, Vanessa Coleman, Alan Taylor-Shearer, Scottie K and new addition Godfrey Bloom.

Godfrey is probably best known as the outspoken former UKIP MEP, but has a long track record of leadership and success in the military, as an economist and in business. He also has a number of published books to his name, and is a regular speaker at a number of universities on military and economic issuses. We are (of course) delighted to have him on board!

This weeks programme includes sections on:-

- EU powergrabs and damp squibs,

- A radical 'Thought for the Day' - nice one Godfrey!

- Human interest

- ISIS, Turkey, Nato

- Choice items from US liberarians Tom Woods and The Cato Institute

- A belly laugh from Batsby, read by Alan Tayler-Shearer.

And Facebook? All items in the programme are cross posted to our Facebook page and we will be working on developing an active facebook presence to generate discussion, support and feedback on our output - please do visit, like the page and please comment!

New content, new contributors are always *welcome*.

www.RadioFreeUK.org

Conservative Rajoy loses majority in Spanish elections

Spanish Prime Minister, Mariano Rajoy, has been punished at the polls with his party losing its majority.

When jobs and money start to run out, people instinctively turn to the left for the illusion of financial security that it provides and in Spain they veered to the far left.

Rajoy's Popular Party still won the most seats but only managed 123 out of the 350 on offer, down from 186 before the election. The socialist party went from 110 seats to 90 but two new far left parties - Podemos and Citizens - came out of obscurity to gain 69 and 49 seats respectively. The chances of Rajoy forming a majority coalition are pretty slim with so few prospective partners and a rainbow coalition highly unlikely due to the highly polarised nature of Spanish politics.

The significant performance of Podemos will hurt the Catalonian independence movement as they are fiercely opposed to the region's secession. If Rajoy muddles on with a minority government he can, at least, rely on support from the far left in trying to stop the Catalonian government from continuing their preparations for statehood following a referendum which saw an 80% vote in favour of independence.

Ah, mierda

Conservative MP for Telford who doctored constituent's email accused of bullying members of staff

Conservative MP for Telford, Lucy Allan, has been accused of bullying members of staff and recordings of phone calls left on an answerphone and given to the Evening Standard would seem to back that up.

Allan hit the news earlier this month after adding an abusive comment to the end of an email she had received from a constituent and posting it on her Facebook page. She initially denied inventing the comment before backtracking and claiming the abusive comment was from another email and she was adding abusive comments she was getting to the post. The post only contained the entire email from a constituent with the words "Unless you die" - apparently sent by someone else - added to the end, the post hadn't been edited and nothing was subsequently added to it but that's her story and she's sticking to it.

A few days after #Rustygate (as local residents started calling it after the pseudonym of the constituent who wrote the original email) Lucy Allan claimed that the police were investigating what was now being described as a "death threat" and her office started informally briefing influential locals they thought would be sympathetic to her cause that a Labour borough councillor was involved. "Rusty" went to the press revealing his true identity as the son of a Labour councillor rather than the councillor himself.

Things were starting to die down but Allan couldn't resist scratching that itch and decided to post what many believed to be a late night drunken Facebook post naming Labour borough councillors (ill-advisedly starting with Cllr Shaun Davies, cabinet member for anything in the papers and a practising solicitor) as the people behind a campaign of harassment, abuse and bullying of her, a "happy, friendly female" and her staff.

The post was deleted, along with her social media accounts but Allan still couldn't keep herself out of trouble. She is now accused of bullying and threatening a member of her staff, accusing her of stealing a computer and being an alcoholic and telling her that if she takes time off sick on advice of her doctor then should would be sacked. Allan has been through a few members of staff and some of them - her former campaign manager included - have come forward to corroborate the accusations made by Arianne Plumbly, telling the Evening Standard that Allan is a bully and that at least two complaints about her conduct have been made to the Conservative Party.

In recordings of phone calls given to the Evening Standard, Allan can be heard swearing at Plumbly when she found out that she was off work sick and threatening to fire her if she didn't come into work. She also tells her that she has no rights and can't go to an employment tribunal. Allan owns an employment law consultancy which makes her bullying even more unacceptable.

Only last month the International Development Minister, Grant Shapps, resigned from his post after a young Conservative Party activist took his own life due to bullying and sexual assault from within the party.

Racist internet troll convicted of inciting racial hatred

Former Conservative internet troll, Joshua Bonehill-Paine, has been convicted of incitement to racial hatred.

Bonhehill-Paine is a domestic extremist who has somehow managed to escape being sent to prison despite convictions for harassment and malicious communications. Every conviction resulting in a slapped wrist has made him bolder, culminating in him trying to organise an anti-Jew protest in Golders Green complete with Nazi imagery. It was this abortive attempt at an anti-Jew protest (which he was unable to see through to the end because of bail conditions that banned him from London) which convinced a jury at Southwark Crown Court to convict him. Hopefully he will be given a substantial custodial sentence and ordered to undergo treatment for what is almost certainly a mental health issue.

Philip Hammond asks EU to suggest a compromise on Dave's compromised compromise

The Foreign Secretary, Philip Hammond, has invited EU member states to come up with alternatives to temporarily removing the right to in-work benefits for EU immigrants after the idea was rejected by every other EU leader.

David Cameron has been promising for years that the Tories would get net immigration down into the tens of thousands whilst every year it goes up and up with net immigration for the 12 months to quarter three of this year standing at 336,000 people. Knowing that it is impossible to prevent unlimited immigration from the EU without leaving, Cameron decided that discouraging EU immigrants coming here for work by removing their right to in-work benefits whilst leaving full access to benefits for unemployed EU immigrants would be just as effective as removing the rights of nearly half a billion citizens of EU member states to live here.

Philip Hammond has told a meeting of EU foreign ministers that the British government is ready to drop Cameron's "demand" for restricting benefits if they can suggest something else equally ineffectual that they can mislead voters into believing is in our interests for long enough to get them to vote to stay in the EU:

We haven’t heard any alternative suggestions that will deliver the same effect [remove benefits from working immigrants but not unemployment benefits, child tax credit, child benefit, council tax rebate, housing benefit, disability benefit, sickness benefit, maternity benefit, etc] in a different way.

But we have made very clear if people have other ideas that will deliver on this very important agenda for British people we are absolutely prepared to listen to them and we are prepared to enter into a dialogue about them, but at the moment the only proposition on the table is our four-year proposal.

Compromising on a compromise that would, at best, result in a compromise on the compromised compromise is so pathetically weak that it's embarrassing.

David Cameron's spokesman responded to Boris Johnson's pronouncement that the UK should seek a Danish-style opt-out on EU immigration by incorrectly claiming that Denmark's opt-out is on the "niche" issue of restrictions on second home ownership. Denmark actually has permanent and automatic opt-outs on adoption of the €uro, defence, justice and home affairs and EU citizenship. Securing such an opt-out (which has already been ruled out) would require treaty change (which has also been ruled out).

There is only one way to limit EU immigration and that is to leave the EU and introduce a fair and unbiased points-based system like the one they use in Australia that doesn't discriminate against people because of their nationality.

Image credit: Guido

EU planning to ban under 16s registering on websites without parental consent

The EU is due to approve new harmonised data protection regulations today that will see under-16s banned from providing their personal details to any website - including social media - without their parents' permission.

The typically ill-thought-out regulations would make it illegal for the likes of Facebook and Twitter to allow under-16s to sign up for their services and prevent charities offering personalised support services for victims of bullying or sexual abuse. Breaching the regulations will attract fines of up to 4% of the company's turnover.

The idea that a child can be held criminally responsible at the age of 10 but needs "protecting" from giving their name to Facebook is ridiculous but you only have to look at the EU cookie directive to see how utterly clueless the EU where technology is concerned.

[UPDATED] Pre-school teacher in Paris stabbed by ISIS terrorist

French police are interviewing the teacher who has apparently admitted to making up the whole story.

A pre-school teacher in France has been stabbed in the side and throat by an Islamic terrorist.

The attack took place at the Préscolaire Jean-Perrin in Paris whilst the teacher was preparing for classes. There were no children present and the teacher's life is not in danger. The attacker said "This is for Daesh. It's a warning". Daesh is another name for ISIS.

A French-language ISIS magazine recently told supporters to kill French teachers for the sin of teaching secularism.

Tactical withdrawal by French socialists leads to defeat Front National

The French Front National have failed to take control of any regions in last week's elections after an unprecedented pact between the socialists and conservatives which saw candidates stood down to help keep Marine Le Pen's party out of power.

Last week's regional elections had overtones of recent elections this side of the channel where left and right have united to stop UKIP from challenging the status quo. The big difference here, of course, is that UKIP isn't a racist party.  But despite the efforts of Marine Le Pen to make her father's party more moderate since she took the helm, it's still some way from being transformed into the kind of moderate party that can gain enough mainstream support to win elections.

The decision by the Socialists to withdraw candidates from the second round of voting to help the conservative Republicans is controversial and undermines the democratic process. Voters marked their preferences knowing how the votes should be split between the Socialists, Republicans and Front National. So-called tactical voting belongs in the ballot box, it is wrong for parties involved in the election to manipulate the result with tactical withdrawals.

If Le Pen continues to reform her party between now and the next election, it is hard to see how they can fail to capitalise on the 6.8m votes it received this time round.

UKIP MEP Jill Seymour launches "Christmas for Cumbria" campaign

West Midlands MEP Jill Seymour has launched a ‘Christmas for Cumbria’ campaign, collecting festive gifts to deliver to flood-hit families in the north of England.

She has set up a drop-off centre at her constituency headquarters in Bridge Road, Wellington, and will be delivering all of Shropshire’s donations to the region early next week.

“We’ve all been touched by the terrible scenes over the past few days, where families watched helplessly as their homes, possessions, and all their Christmas preparations, were destroyed,” said Mrs Seymour.

“And when the flood water finally disappears, the hard work really starts. That’s when these families have to return to their severely-damaged homes trying to salvage their possessions.

“This appeal isn’t about providing furniture, bedding or blankets – it’s about the people of Shropshire giving the flood-hit families of Cumbria a special little treat for Christmas.”

Mrs Seymour is urging people to wrap up a gift and deliver it to her office, Independence House, 27 Bridge Road, Wellington, TF1 1ED, any time between 9.30am and 4pm from Monday to Thursday this week.

“It would be a big help if they could be marked up so that we know if the gifts are for males or females, adults or children.

“I plan to drive up to Cumbria on Tuesday next week with Shropshire’s donations, and hopefully put a smile on some people’s faces at such a difficult time in their lives.

“I want the people of Cumbria who have been affected by these devastating floods to know that they are in thoughts of families here in Shropshire.”

For more information, call Jill Seymour’s constituency office on 01952 924040, or email enquiries@jseymourmep.co.uk

All EU leaders opposed to restricting benefits

The unelected president of the EU Council, Donald Tusk, has told MEPs that every EU member state is opposed to restricting in-work benefits for EU immigrants and that David Cameron will have to give up on the idea.

It also looks like he's got to wait until February to see what bones he's going to be tossed to spin into a "victory" after Angela Merkel phoned him up and told him it's not going to happen before Christmas.

Cameron told he will have to compromise on immigrant benefits compromise

The unelected president of the EU Commission, Donald Tusk, has told David Cameron that there are "substantial political differences" over his "demand" to prevent in-work benefits being paid to EU immigrants for the first 4 years that they live here.

Faced with the impossibility of EU countries agreeing to end open borders and determined to keep us in the EU, the only option Cameron has is to make the UK less attractive to benefits tourists. He has "demanded" the right to stop in-work benefits (but not out of work benefits like child benefit, unemployment benefit, housing benefit, disability benefits, etc) for EU immigrants for the first four years they live here. Bizarrely, Cameron's immigration compromise is designed to make the UK less attractive to people coming here to work and more attractive to people coming here just to claim benefits.

This is already a pathetically weak compromise that fails to address the underlying problem - free movement of people - and the expectation is that further compromises to the compromise will have to be made. It's difficult to understand what further compromises can be made without rendering the whole thing completely pointless rather than largely ineffectual as it is now.

Image credit: Guido

Paul Nuttall appointed leader of UKIP MEPs

Paul Nuttall MEP has been appointed group leader of the UKIP delegation in the EU Parliament.

Nuttall was elected as an MEP for the north west of England in 2009 and was re-elected in last year's historic EU elections which saw UKIP gain the most MEPs of any UK party.

Tube passenger gets throat cut by extremist in revenge for Syria

A man has slashed the throat of a tube passenger and threatened others in London whilst shouting "this is for Syria".

The man reportedly stabbed a passenger multiple times, including slashing his throat and threatened other passengers before police tasered him. As he was being led away from the scene he shouted "This is what happens when you fuck with mother Syria, all of your blood will be spilled".

And so it begins ...

Conservative leader of Shropshire Council resigns and reported to police for misconduct in public office

The Conservative leader of Shropshire Council has resigned as a councillor and director of a council-owned company amid accusations of misconduct.

Cllr Keith Barrow was investigated by a firm of solicitors on behalf of the council after he was reported to their standards board by UKIP councillor Dave Tremellen for failing to declare an interest in the appointment of a firm of accountants for the council's IP&E company. The investigation concluded that although he had acted improperly in failing to declare that the accountants being appointed were his personal accountants he didn't exert any undue influence.

Barrow unexpectedly resigned yesterday before news of him being reported to West Mercia Police for misconduct in public office was made public. We understand that a second referral to the standards committee was due to be made yesterday on a related matter.

Take back the media! support RadioFreeUK.org for #EUout!

Irony?!?! A time loop?!?!

Ok this blog entry in Bloggers4UKIP by RadioFreeUK to let you know that I included a blog entry from here - Bloggers4UKIP in the RadioFreeUK.org Friday show!

It was a great item - and deserves to go on record, even it events have moved on a bit!

It was Stuart Parr's analysis of David Cameron's letter to the EU Commission on his 'demands' for reform! (snork!) and can be heard here:

http://www.radiofreeuk.org/show/20151204/4/

RadioFreeUK.org is a ground up thing... I can do the tech - and have been... but I can't do *everything* (but pretty much have been!) - take a look (or listen!) its kind of BBC Radio 4 but without the pro EU, left wing 'progressive' agenda. Its young, dynamic, it has a long way to go and will change a lot over time.

Take back the media! support RadioFreeUK.org for #EUout!

Labour hold Oldham West & Royton

Despite the best efforts of John Bickley and his UKIP team, Labour managed to hold on to Oldham West & Royton in yesterday's by-election.

Despite the bookies getting twitchy, the election had already been won before election day thanks to Labour's postal voting machine which generated a massive 25% postal turnout.

UKIP's vote share was up 2.8%, Labour's was up 7.3%, the Lib Dems lost their deposit and the Tories dropped 9.6% of the vote since May. Overall turnout was down 19.3% from the general election.

Candidate	Party	Votes	%	+/-
Jim McMahon	Labour	17,209	62.1%	+7.3%
John Bickley	UKIP	6,487	23.4%	+2.8%
James Daly	Conservatives	2,596	9.4%	-9.6%
Jane Brophy	Lib Dem	1,024	3.7%	0.0%
Simeon Hart	Green	249	0.9%	-1.0%
Sir Oink A-Lot	Monster Raving Loony	141	0.5%	N/A

Well done to John Bickley and his team for an excellent election campaign.

Oldham deserves better than Labour, vote John Bickley

Voters go to the polls in Oldham West & Royton today to choose a replacement for the late Michael Meacher who sadly passed away in late October.

Oldham has been described as a "one party state" due to Labour's dominance in the city as the former party of the working class. But the city that once elected Sir Winston Churchill - thought by many to be the greatest and most principled leader we've ever had - deserves better than four more years of Labour, Jeremy Corbyn and the IRA supporting communist tax dodger, Jim McMahon.

UKIP is the only party that can end Labour's rule in Oldham and give people in the north and MP that works for real people, not corporate interests or unaccountable quangos and organisations. John Bickley is a successful businessman from a working class family, not a career politician.

Conservative MP for Telford invents abusive comment from constituent

The Conservative MP for Telford, Lucy Allan, has been accused of doctoring an email from a constituent to include an abusive closing comment.

Unfortunately for Lucy, the constituent in question posted screenshots of the original email exchange showing that the email had been "sexed up".

When details were posted in the Telford group on Facebook, Lucy Allan allegedly reported the constituent's Facebook account resulting in it being suspended for a day. Faced with a barrage of negative publicity, Allan first claimed that the last line "Unless you die" was sent in another email before finally admitting that it was taken from someone else's email and added to Rusty's.

Allan is one of this year's new MPs, ousting Labour MP David Wright from his marginal seat in this year's general election. But inexperience is no excuse for breaking the strict MP/Constituent confidentiality or for making up abuse from constituents. It's lucky for Lucy that "Rusty Shackleton" is a pseudonym - not that she knew it at the time - because attributing false comments to somebody that could damage someone's reputation is libel.

"Rusty" has started a petition calling on Lucy Allan to resign which has been suspended while the parliament petitions people "check it meets petition standards". Apparently this might take a few days by which time most people will probably have forgotten about it. Which is convenient.

Cameron told AGAIN that he can't restrict benefits for EU immigrants

The leaders of Hungary, Poland, the Czech Republic and Slovakia have told David Cameron that they will block his futile attempts to stop immigrants claiming benefits until they've paid into the system for four years.

Although curbing immigration still remains one of Cameron's key promises despite spectacularly failing to prevent it rocketing over the last few years, he has dropped it from the list of "demands" for his sham renegotiation. He is instead pathetically trying to discourage people from wanting to move here by making them wait for benefits rather than defy the EU.

Men and women segregated at Labour meeting in Oldham

Pictures of a Labour Party campaign meeting organised by Labour Friends of Bangladesh in Oldham show the women and men clearly segregated.

The pictures were shared on Twitter by Labour MP Debbie Abrahams and immediately drew criticism with UKIP's candidate, John Bickley, who said:

How can it be acceptable in modern Britain that a political party that wishes to represent all the people, and in particular the various communities of Oldham, thinks that it's ok to segregate by gender?

This isn't a one-off either. Earlier this year man-hating female supremacist Harriet Harman defended a segregated Labour event in Birmingham saying it was better to have a segregated meeting than a men-only one.

Peterlee Labour councillors found to have bullied former clerk

Labour-run Peterlee Town Council has agreed to pay £200k in compensation to its former clerk after an independent panel found that it had bullied her when she was on sick leave.

Two Labour councillors - Mandy Thompson and Bill Jeffrey - apparently questioned whether the then clerk, Jane Russell, should be paid her full £60k salary after being off sick for more than 6 months and inappropriately involved the police.

The council is also expected to have to cover a £100k legal bill.

Grant Shapps resigns after taking responsibility for bullying that led to activist's suicide

The International Development Minister, Grant Shapps, has resigned amid claims that he failed to act on allegations of bullying and sexual assault against a youth activist that led to his suicide.

Shapps said that although he could find no written record of a complaint regarding the alleged abuse of 21 year old Elliot Johnson, as party chairman he was taking responsibility and resigning.

His predecessor, Baroness Warsi, wrote to Shapps earlier this year asking for action to be taken against the youth organiser alleged to have been responsible or at least complicit in the abuse, Mark Clarke. Even though Clarke had been struck off the Conservative Party's approved candidate list over complaints about his behaviour, Shapps decided to give him "a second chance" and appointed him as director of the Conservative youth programme that was allegedly responsible for driving Elliot Johnson to take his own life.

Grant Shapps has done the right thing in resigning as his judgement was clearly incredibly flawed. This isn't the first report of bullying or abuse in the Conservative Party but the first one I can recall with such a tragic ending. Clearly the Conservative Party has a problem that they need to address and having one of their own peers leading an investigation into the problem isn't going to solve it.