fbpx
Search Donate

Show results for
  • News
  • Videos
  • Action Alerts
  • Events
  • Resources
  • MEND

Six UKIP candidates face investigation over alleged far right sympathies

Six UKIP candidates face investigation over alleged far right sympathies

Categories: Latest News

Monday March 02 2015

As UKIP’s Spring conference in Margate concluded yesterday, the Mail on Sunday today reports on an investigation launched by the party into six candidates who have allegedly shared or posted offensive material from far right organisations like the British National Party on social media pages.

Disclosures of UKIP candidates breaching the party’s constitutional rules on membership of far right movements or political parties, such as the BNP, Britain First, English Defence League, Liberty GB etc, have come to light in recent elections with a spate of news articles uncovering racist and Islamophobic sentiments being expressed by UKIP candidates and supporters.

The Mail on Sunday uncovers the latest in these revelations with a report on six candidates who have allegedly shared posts from Britain First, the far right organisation behind the ‘Christian patrols’ in east London and ‘mega-mosque invasions’; liked the Facebook pages of Britain First and the English Defence League; shared posts by another far right splinter group, Infidels of Britain.

The candidates in question are:

Bill Walker, UKIP candidate for Aldershot in Hampshire, who is said to have shared a post from the British National Party which shows a “racist cartoon featuring a black man holding guns with ‘Kill Whitey’ on his T-shirt, a Sikh man holding a knife with ‘Honour Killing Rocks’ on his T-shirt and a Muslim man holding a grenade and a Koran in his hands with ‘Death to the Infidels’ scrawled on the front of his Islamic dress.”

The picture shows a white family wearing T shirts emblazoned with the Union Jack and a man on a soapbox labelled ‘Media’ saying “As you can see, THIS is the problem that must be stamped out in our country.”

Walker is said to have retweeted the picture from the page of Southampton based UKIP activist called, David Jones, who had added the comment: “Brits are treated like second-class citizens in their own country” to the post.

Michael Waddington, UKIP candidate for Pendle who shared a post by Britain First.

Steve Wood, UKIP candidate for Bristol South who lists Britain First and Infidels of Britain among his Facebook likes.

Geoffrey Bastin, UKIP candidate for Bexhill and Battle who Facebook likes include the English Defence League.

Steve Emmens, UKIP candidate for Norwich South who shared a post by Britain First.

Barry Elliott, UKIP candidate for Blyth Valley who shared an ‘Infidels of Britain’ picture showing the late Enoch Powell with the caption “I tried to warn you” on his Facebook page.

Only recently the UKIP candidate for the Hampstead and Kilburn seat, Magnus Nielsen, called for licences to be issued, and if necessary revoked, for all mosques and Islamic clergy in the UK. And the party’s MEP, Stewart Agnew, spoke in favour of banning religious slaughter in the UK saying UKIP’s manifesto on animal welfare would be the “strongest of any major political party in the UK.”

Last month, UKIP’s candidate for Newport East, Donald Grewar, stood down after he posted supportive comments in response to a Facebook post by the English Defence League claiming “no surrender to militant Islam or political correctness,” and fellow party member, Malcolm Jackson, was stripped of membership after he was found to have attended an anti-mosque rally organised by Britain First in Rochester.

In preparation of the European Parliament elections in May last year, UKIP announced “stricter vetting procedures” of candidates to ensure compliance with party rules which maintain that the party and members “shall conduct itself and its affairs in such a way that it does not discriminate against or in favour of any person on the grounds of their race, religion, ethnic origin, education, beliefs, sexual orientation, class, social status, sectarianism or any other basis prescribed by law.”

Newsletter

Find out more about MEND, sign up to our email newsletter

Get all the latest news from MEND straight to your inbox. Sign up to our email newsletter for regular updates and events information

reCAPTCHA