A Party that has to cancel its National Conference because of lack
of support is not serious. Membership has declined over 10% since May’s General
Election as well.
In last week’s post I argued with just seven months to
go to the Assembly elections that it was high time that the indigenous
political parties of Wales addressed the potential threat of UKIP with a far
greater degree of urgency and seriousness than hitherto. I also went on to say
that the Welsh electorate for their part must consider with some degree of
seriousness and detail what has UKIP really got to offer Wales.
The headline
was:-
Time for Welsh political parties to ‘wake up’ and the Welsh
people to ‘wise up’ to what UKIP is about.
Well the Welsh people certainly can’t give them any
credibility now. A party that has had to cancel its Welsh Conference is not a
serious enough party to play a part in our General Election. According to a
spokesman for the company handling ticket sales for the conference –
Ticketsource - the event has been shelved due to ‘POOR advanced ticket sales’. But
in order to try and pull the wool of everyone’s eyes their UK (effectively
England!) annual spring conference next year is to be held in Llandudno. Good
attempt at salvaging a most embarrassing situation.
It’s not my line but a good one nevertheless and worth
repeating – ‘they are no longer UKIP but ENGIP (littlenglanders)’.
I also suggested in last week’s post that Welsh voters
give serious consideration to what possible benefits is it for them to vote for
a party whose roots are entirely based in England. It has no Welsh tradition,
heritage or background whatsoever. It is English to the core. Indeed they are
looking to import former Tory MPs from England to stand for election to the
Welsh Assembly.
I have read that a few former Tory MPs who are now
members of UKIP are considering standing for the Senedd - persons such as Neil
Hamilton and Mark Reckless. The latter was MP for Rochester and Stroud and is
charged with drawing up UKIP’s manifesto for Wales. So the intention is for our
Senedd to become a dumping ground for ex Tory cast-offs. Seriously is that what the people of Wales
would want?
UKIP is obviouslyan English party that was founded in 1991 as a Eurosceptic and right- wing
populist political party but has seen opportunities to participate in Welsh
politics. It has no instinctive place in our politics other than using our
Nation as a stepping stone to achieve its two obsessive objectives which are to
get Britain out of Europe and exploit the anti-immigration card. Bit similar to the Tory party in the UK if the utterances of the Foreign Secretary and the the Home Secretary's are to be listened to.
I have argued
for several years that the way politics is conducted in the Assembly is far too
‘cosy’ and that it desperately needs a ‘breath of fresh air’ and certainly more
vigorous debate. There are now increasing signs of that beginning to happen most
notably from Kirsty Williams and the Liberal Democrats but also to be fair Plaid
Cymru. Obviously for my part I want the Liberal Democrats to be the party that
will open up and shake up the Assembly after the May elections. We have a long
road to travel but with the UKIP fiasco of recent days the window of
opportunity is opening wide.
In the last
post I also mentioned that I had been on the UKIP Wales web-site to see what
the party said in relation to Wales at last May’s UK General Election. Didn’t
expect much and was quite correct. True that there were a few references to
Wales in a Manifesto that had as its front cover ‘Believe in Wales’ but on
closer examination it was almost entirely a re-run of their UK manifesto.
This morning I
went back again on to the site and nothing at all had changed with regard to policies
and that they are still inviting suggestions from the general public as what
their policies should be. Again it is not surprising because they don’t have much
idea about Wales and I doubt much interest either. Indeed their leader Farage
at their Doncaster conference said 2016 election
in Wales is only to be seen in the context of maintaining the momentum for a
‘No’ vote in the Euro referendum. He clearly stated, and I watched him, that
nothing else matters to him.
But there one
change on the site - a new page and advert for their Welsh Conference in
Swansea on October 23rd! It
was a bit pathetic to read. A full page invitation to register for the
conference under the banner headline of the ‘Say NO Tour campaign’ with the
beaming faces of Farage and Nathan Gill. Proof positive that the whole exercise
is about Europe, forget Welsh politics and our Senedd.