What is UKIP all about?  That, apparently, is what some people commenting on this site are asking.

So UKIP Daily did some digging and, thanks to our reader Elizabeth Curzon-Howe, found a message from our leader Gerard Batten which appears on the party website under about.  It says:

Dear Enquirer,

Thank you for visiting our website.

The political and media establishment hoped that UKIP would disappear in February 2018. It didn’t.

In fact, since then our support, membership and fundraising has been increasing.

UKIP is the only real opposition to our cross-party political establishment. There is no real difference between the Conservative, Labour and Lib-Dem parties.

They all want continued membership of the European Union, they all want continued mass immigration, and they are all out of touch with the vast majority of voters.

If you go on voting for them then you cannot expect any different outcomes.

If you want something different then support, join and vote UKIP.

Under my leadership UKIP will be the party that represents freedom:

  • Freedom from the Euro-collective.
  • Freedom from political correctness and Cultural Marxism.
  •  Freedom of speech.
  • Freedom to be proud to be British.
  • Freedom to be proud of our history and heritage.
  • Freedom to live under our laws – not the laws of Brussels.

UKIP’s mission is to show the way forward for Britain as an independent, self-governing, democratic nation.

We want trade, friendship and co-operation with the world.

We want a political system and government that represents the real interests of our country and our people.

Come and join us – help make it happen.

 

This message is to non-Kippers, but to me, that is a straightforward, honest summary of what the party is all about.

Of course, the party has had its ups and downs – what party hasn’t, and after the referendum of 2016, voters gained the impression that the referendum had been won and we were heading out of the EU.

How wrong they were!

Since then we have seen concession after concession handed to the EU by the Prime Minister Theresa May, the latest being the clever wording of the Chequers plan that actually says we’re happy to continue being ruled by the European Court of Human Rights.  I am no lawyer – I don’t understand such things, but apparently, legal minds have indicated that’s what it really means.

Not surprising really – Theresa May was always a Remainer and if she can pull the wool over the eyes of the majority of British people about this, I’m sure she will.  Lucky there are some powerful people who DO know what they’re talking about and they have advised we don’t touch this with a barge pole.

Lucky, too, that we have Michel Barnier – what am I saying?!!! -– because he has rejected the agreement.  What a stupid man he is!  If only he would make a few concessions he could have a great agreement with the British government, but as long as he keeps saying ‘Non’, we have a chance of making clean break and going to WTO rules.

It’s such a pity that there are so many voters who think we simply won’t survive without the EU.  What do they think will happen?  The latest installment of Project Fear is alive and well with talk of food and medicine shortages, of queues at the Channel ports and of the UK being ‘unable to cope’ without being shackled to the EU.  What absolute nonsense!

We Brits managed extremely well in two World Wars, the last one against the old enemy that was taking over Europe.  We had shortages, of course, but did we go under?  Did we buckle under the pressure that was brought to bear from Europe?  The hell we did!  And we won’t again.

I have little doubt that things will be difficult for a time if we leave the bloc without a deal but the British are a resilient people; we’ve coped with much worse during WWII and we’ll cope again, and after a while things will settle down and be very much better once we don’t have to pay such exorbitant sums to an organisation that lays down the rules under which we trade with the rest of the world.

We’ll save ourselves a lot of money, although I have to disagree with those who claim we have promised £350million a week to the NHS.  If you read the ‘Boris bus’ carefully it says: ‘We send the EU £350 million a week.  Let’s fund the NHS instead.’  It’s a suggestion – and a good one, but it’s not a promise.

As Gerard says above, once we have left the EU we will be free from the Euro-collective, free from political correctness and free from Cultural Marxism.  We will be free to speak our minds – Heaven knows we can’t do that at the moment for fear of offending any ‘snowflakes’.  We will be free to live under our own laws, having rejected the laws of Brussels, we will be free to be proud of our history and heritage instead of having such heritage subsumed into the great European project, and, best of all, we will be free to be proud to be British.

For me, that’s the best freedom.

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