GE 2024: results so far – the ethno-nationalist, civic nationalist, and patriotic spectrum
While there are differences of emphasis and factional allegiance among H&D readers, the following are candidates whose results will be of particular interest. It is evident that outside Northern Ireland, patriotic candidates found themselves overshadowed by the Nigel Farage show. Voters are about to learn a very hard lesson, that Farage is a shallow charlatan. He will shamelessly court media attention for the next five years, while doing nothing to build a party. It will be up to genuine patriots to reunite and build a real alternative to the politics of spivvery and betrayal.
British Democrats:
Basildon & Billericay – Chris Bateman – 373 (0.9%)
Doncaster N – Frank Calladine – 1,160 (3.7%)
Faversham & Mid Kent – Lawrence Rustem – 171 (0.4%)
Maidstone & Malling – Gary Butler – 156 (0.3%)
English Democrats:
Barnsley N – Janus Polenceusz – 42 (0.1%)
Barnsley S – Maxine Spencer [standing as Patriots Alliance] – 149 (0.4%)
Bolton W – Patrick McGrath – 202 (0.5%)
Boston & Skegness – David Dickason – 518 (1.3%)
Brentwood & Ongar – Robin Tilbrook – 189 (0.4%)
Bradford South – Therese Hirst – 248 (0.8%)
Bury South – Steve Morris – 224 (0.5%)
Dover & Deal – Steve Laws – 185 (0.4%)
Dunstable & Leighton Buzzard – Antonio Vitiello [standing as Patriots Alliance] – 77 (0.2%)
East Grinstead & Uckfield – William Highton – 2,036 (4.0%)
Great Yarmouth – Catherine Blaiklock – withdrawn but still on ballot paper – 171 (0.4%)
Leigh & Atherton – Craig Buckley – 376 (0.9%)
Makerfield – Thomas Bryer – 368 (0.9%)
Newark – Matthew Darrington – 156 (0.3%)
Shrewsbury – Chris Bovill – 241 (0.5%)
Traditional Unionist Voice:
Belfast East – John Ross – 1,918 (4.5%)
Belfast North – David Clarke – 2,877 (7.1%)
Belfast South & Mid Down – Dan Boucher – 2,218 (5.1%)
Belfast West – Ann McClure – 2,010 (5.1%)
East Antrim – Matthew Warwick – 4,135 (10.4%)
East Londonderry – Allister Kyle – 4,363 (10.6%)
Lagan Valley – Lorna Smyth – 2,186 (4.5%)
Mid Ulster – Glenn Moore – 2,978 (6.6%)
Newry & Armagh – Keith Ratcliffe – 4,099 (8.9%)
North Antrim – Jim Allister – 11,642 (28.3%) WINNER
South Antrim – Mel Lucas – 2,693 (6.3%)
South Down – Jim Wells – 1,893 (4.2%)
Strangford – Ron McDowell – 3,143 (8.1%)
West Tyrone – Stevan Patterson – 2,530 (5.8%)
Independents:
Chichester – Andrew Emerson – 190 (0.4%)
Liverpool Wavertree – Joe Owens – 108 (0.3%)
North Down – Alex Easton – 20,913 (48.3%) WINNER
British Unionist:
Airdrie & Shotts – John Jo Leckie – 456 (1.2%)
Motherwell, Wishaw & Carluke – Gus Ferguson – 158 (0.4%)
English Constitution Party:
Broxbourne – Brett Frewin – 87 (0.2%)
Chorley – Graham Moore – 1,007 (3.0%)
Romford – Colin Birch – 195 (0.4%)
St Helens N – Joe Greenhalgh – 274 (0.7%)
Rearranging the deckchairs
Larry the Downing Street cat will have a new master very soon, although his master’s masters will (for the time being) remain the same.
Polls have opened in today’s General Election, and one of the H&D team was at his local polling station to vote at 7.05 am.
In a small number of constituencies around the UK, voters will have a genuine patriotic option to back candidates from the British Democrats, English Democrats, Traditional Unionist Voice, or a handful of anti-immigration independents.
But for most of us, this election is important not because we are able to cast a positive vote, but because we can rejoice at an impending political earthquake that will destroy the Conservative Party.
This has been a dominant force in the affairs of our nation since the 1840s, but it has long since ceased to be the Conservative & Unionist Party of Chamberlain and Bonar Law.
Today’s Tories are an obstacle to building the nationalist revolution.
That obstacle is crumbling into dust, and for that alone, this week’s epochal election will be cause for rejoicing.
Best of luck to all genuine patriots standing today.
You will obtain no short-term reward, other than the knowledge that you have played your part in laying the foundations for national and racial renaissance.
And that is a reward beyond price.
In Belfast, the election counts will take place at the Titanic Centre. An appropriate symbol for the election that will see Starmer replace Sunak, in charge of rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic as the sham of parliamentary ‘democracy’ approaches the iceberg.
1964–2019: And then there were none. H&D editor Mark Cotterill examines the end of a nationalist era
While out in downtown Preston earlier this week for lunch with a couple of H&D subscribers – one of whom had travelled up from Leicester on a family matter – the main matter of conversation was (of course) the General Election and whom we would – or should – be voting for. As none of us happen to live in a constituency with British Democrat or English Democrat candidates, our group was mixed with one going for ADF, another for UKIP, two for independents and three for Reform UK. The conversation got round to the fact that the once mighty British National Party (BNP) and National Front (NF) were not standing any candidates in this year’s General Election.
My colleague from Leicester – knowing I’m an “anorak” on such matters – asked: “Mark, how far back do you have to go to find a GE where neither the BNP nor NF (in any of its forms) had even a single candidate”?
Now even though I class myself as a “smarty pants” on movement history, I was not sure, but guessed at 1966. However, after “Googling” it, I found that I was wrong (shock, horror!). The start of the era of BNP and NF candidates turned out to be the election before in 1964 – where former H&D subscriber John Bean (now sadly deceased) contested Southall for the BNP (mark II), polling 3,410 votes – 9.1%.
At the 2019 GE, David Furness contested Hornchurch and Upminster for the BNP (mark IV), polling 510 votes – 0.9%, which will in all probability be the last time the BNP ever contests a GE.
Fun Facts For Anoraks – from previous General Elections
In 1966, the BNP fielded three candidates: John Bean again in Southall, 2,768 – 7.4%; Gerald Rowe in Deptford 1,906 – 7%; and Robert Stanley in Smethwick 508 – 1.5%.
In 1970, when the NF contested ten seats, this was the last General Election when candidates appeared on the ballot paper without a party name. The best result being the Rev. Brian Green in Islington, who polled 1,232 – 5.6%.
In February 1974 the NF fielded over 50 candidates and so qualified for the first time for a 5-minute TV and radio broadcast. The best result was Gordon Bowen in West Bromwich West who polled 3,107 – 7.8%.
In October 1974, the NF increased their number of candidates to 90. The best result was Robin May in Hackney South & Shoreditch with 2,544 – 9.4%.
In 1979 even though the NF fielded over 300 candidates, they were still only given one five-minute TV and radio broadcast. The best result was John Tyndall in Hackney South & Shoreditch, who polled 1,958 – 7.6%.
In 1983 both the NF and BNP contested over 50 seats, so were given one TV and radio broadcast each. The NF fielded 60 candidates. Their best result was Ian Anderson, in Newham South, who polled 993 – 3.7%. The BNP fielded 54 candidates, their best result was Charles Parker (Tyndall’s father-in-law) in Walsall South, who polled 632 – 1.3%.
In 1987, both the NF and BNP decided not to contest the GE due to a shortage of both manpower (due to the recent splits) and funds (the cost of a deposit had recently gone up from £150 to £500). However, Mike Kingston still contested Bristol East for the NF Flag Group, and two BNP candidates – Mike Easter in Tonbridge and Malling, and Alfie Waite in Ravensbourne – stood, against the strict orders of John Tyndall, who expelled them both shortly after the election. (Though both Mike and Alfie were later readmitted, the latter working at the BNP’s bookshop/headquarters during the 1990s.)
In 1992, all fourteen NF candidates were from the NF “Flag Group”. The “official” NF faction had ceased to exist, and its few remaining members had joined the Third Way or the Third Position. The best NF result was George Cartwright in Dudley East who polled 675 – 1.2%. The BNP fielded thirteen candidates (just one fewer than the NF). The best result was Richard Edmonds in Bethnal Green & Stepney with 1,310 votes – 3.6%.
In 1997, nationalist votes started to increase for the first time in over twenty years. The BNP fielded 56 candidates. The best result being in Bethnal Green & Bow where BNP candidate, Dave King polled 3,350 – 7.5%. The NF fielded six candidates. Their best result was George Cartwright in Dudley North, who polled 559 – 1.2%.
In 2001, the BNP fielded 33 candidates. Their vote went up further with six candidates saving their deposits. The best result being Nick Griffin in Oldham West & Royton who polled 6,552 – 16.4%. The NF fielded five candidates. Their best result was Mick Shore in Birmingham Erdington, who polled 681 – 2.2%.
In 2005, the BNP fielded a record 119 candidates, 34 of them of saving their deposits, the best result being in Barking, where Richard Barnbrook polled 4,916 – 17%. The NF fielded thirteen candidates. The best result was Graham Kemp in Feltham & Heston, who polled 975 – 2.6%.
In 2010, the BNP fielded an incredible 338 candidates – the highest number ever – beating the NF’s 301/303 in 1979. 74 of them saved their deposits, the best result being again in Barking, where Nick Griffin polled 6,620 – 14.6%. This was the last election where the BNP beat UKIP, even though their average vote went down to 1.9%. The NF fielded seventeen candidates. The best result being Chris Jackson in Rochdale who polled 2,236 – 4.9% (failing to save his deposit by just twelve votes).
In 2015, the BNP only managed to field eight candidates (330 down from the previous election). The best result being in Charnwood where Cathy Duffy polled 489 – 0.9%. The NF fielded seven candidates. The best result being Kevin Bryan in Rochdale with 433 – 1%. This was the last GE the NF contested.
In 2017, the BNP fielded ten candidates. The best result being in Bishop Auckland, where BNP chairman Adam Walker polled 991 – 2.3%.
Quiz Time
Finally, a quiz for those of you who think you are as smart as me on movement history!
In 1979 the NF officially contested 301 seats; however, a lot of the Mainstream Media always state it was 303.
The discrepancy of two seats is because the NF directorate (i.e. Martin Webster) disowned two of their candidates that year.
If you can (a) name those two candidates and the constituencies they were standing in; and b) tell me why they were disowned, you will win a free year’s subscription to Heritage and Destiny magazine – or if you are already a subscriber we will extend your current subscription for a further 12 months or 6 issues.
Please email your answers to – heritageanddestiny@yahoo.com
Please note that former members of the 1979 NF Directorate cannot take part as they will probably already know the answer – that is if any of them are still compos mentis! 🧐
Mark Cotterill – Editor/Publisher – Heritage and Destiny
Farage shows his true colours: a spiv and a traitor
During the past 48 hours Nigel Farage has shown why no true nationalist should support Reform UK.
Regular readers will know that we were already disgusted by Farage’s blatant betrayal of Traditional Unionist Voice, the party with which Farage’s Reform UK struck an electoral pact at the start of this year’s General Election campaign, only to see Farage unilaterally tear up the deal within weeks.
Reform UK went on to betray one candidate after another, throwing them under a bus at the slightest hint of anti-woke opinions, and in effect kneeling – BLM-style – in obeisance to ‘anti-racist’ lobby groups.
Yesterday one of the party’s major donors addressed Reform UK’s largest rally of the campaign. Zia Yusuf – a former executive director of Goldman Sachs, whose parents came to the UK from Sri Lanka in the 1980s – is the most public face of Farage’s multiracialism.
Another facet of Farage’s City spiv values – revealing that Reform UK is a true Goldman Sachs party, not a nationalist party – was his response this morning to the success of Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (Rassemblement National – RN).
Now, let’s be absolutely clear. Le Pen’s movement is not racial nationalist. Even in its previous incarnation as the Front National, under Marine’s father Jean-Marie Le Pen, this was a multiracialist party. I twice attended the FN’s main rally in Paris, where Jean-Marie Le Pen was introduced by a half-African singer.
The entire tradition of French nationalism has always contained a stronger element of multiracialism than our equivalent traditions in the UK. The FN (and to a lesser extent the RN) were always ‘broad church’ parties: they combined Pétainists and Gaullists; racial nationalists and non-Whites; Catholics and pagans. That looks strange to a British nationalist, but that’s how they have always been.
Whereas many H&D readers would criticise Le Pen for not being sufficiently pro-White, Farage criticises her from the opposite angle! He showed his true colours long ago when he said that Le Pen’s movement’s “roots were deep in Vichy” and that “anti-semitism was embedded in its DNA”.
This morning he went further, choosing this moment to denounce Le Pen’s party and proclaim that he preferred the approach of her ‘centrist’ rival Emmanuel Macron.
Farage went so far as to say that a victory for Le Pen’s party would be a “disaster” for France. In effect Farage’s Goldman Sachs party is a natural ally of Macron’s Rothschild party.
The one difference is that Farage wobbles all over the place when he is asked about Ukraine and Russia.
As we have previously exposed, Farage has a long history of making some token reference to Putin being a dictator, but then effectively spreading softcore Putinist propaganda, before flipping back to ‘cover’ himself by making some meaningless anti-Putin statement.
He has continued this policy during the past fortnight. It’s difficult to say whether this reflects Farage’s lack of formal education – he went straight from school to become a City spiv – or whether there is a more sinister agenda at work.
The one certainty is that Farage’s response to Le Pen does not reflect any ‘responsible’ attitude on his part to fiscal matters. Reform UK’s manifesto is by far the most irresponsible document of the entire election campaign, making a string of impossible, uncosted pledges.
Farage’s underlying values, however, remain those of a City spiv. He has absolutely no interest in working people. While we can criticise Marine Le Pen for many things – multiracialism, Zionism, abandonment of some French nationalist traditions, betrayal of her comrades – we must admit that she has aligned the RN strongly with the interests of French workers who have consistently been betrayed by the political and financial ‘elite’.
Farage and Reform UK are the opposite. They stand for crony capitalism, not British workers – and this is the main reason why their immigration policy would simply continue the Great Replacement, which serves the interests of global capitalism.
H&D readers should avoid Reform UK like the plague.
This week’s election will signal the death of the Conservative Party, but Reform UK represents no improvement, and if anything serves to discredit the broader nationalist cause.
We are in a time of transition, but the positive development is that a small number of genuine patriots are fighting for a real anti-immigration policy. These are the candidates of the British Democrats and English Democrats, plus independent candidates in some constituencies such as Dr Andrew Emerson in Chichester and Joe Owens in Liverpool Wavertree.
Of course these are only ripples of resistance compared to the tidal wave that is crashing down on the French political establishment. But we have something to build on, in the new political era that will dawn on Friday.
The message is simple: reject Farage, and start building a radical alternative above the ruins of the old order.
French voters’ revolt against multiculturalism takes Le Pen’s party to brink of power
Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) has made huge gains in the first round of the French parliamentary elections.
While it is obvious that there has been a tremendous swing in favour of the RN (and against ‘centrist’ President Emmanuel Macron), the two-round system used in France means that anti-RN voters will again have the opportunity to strike deals in next Sunday’s decisive second round and block nationalist victories.
The ‘right-wing’ of the conservative Republicans (a party seemingly in terminal decline) had already struck a deal with Le Pen by which they were allowed a free run in more affluent areas, including parts of central Paris.
However, it’s difficult to imagine that these people would be reliable allies of an RN government, since their economic ideas are at the opposite pole to Le Pen’s. (It’s already clear that Le Pen herself will concentrate on campaigning to succeed Macron eventually as President: the Prime Minister of any potential RN government would be her young colleague and party chairman, Jordan Bardella.)
Complete results from the first round will not be available until tomorrow, but the two most reliable projections give the RN 33% or 33.5%; the broad left-wing ‘popular front’ 28.5%; Macron’s ‘centrists’ 22%; and the Republicans around 10%.
One of the few certainties is that Éric Zemmour’s party Reconquête, which until early 2022 seemed poised to overtake the RN as the main force in French anti-immigration / nationalist politics, has been destroyed, polling only about 0.5%.
Zemmour expelled the majority of his own MEPs (including Le Pen’s niece Marion Maréchal) in a row over whether to negotiate with the RN. His party now seems to consist only of himself, his girlfriend Sarah Knafo, and a tiny faction of Putinists and irreconcilable enemies of Le Pen.
H&D will examine the French results and the emerging transformation of European nationalism in further analyses on this website (once detailed results are available), and in the next edition of our magazine.
A real alternative for Lancashire voters
H&D‘s assistant editor Peter Rushton was out on the campaign trail yesterday in the Lancashire town of Leigh, working with Craig Buckley (English Democrat candidate for the Leigh & Atherton constituency) and his team.
As regular readers will know, Craig and two other Lancashire ED candidates (Thomas Bryer in Makerfield and Paddy McGrath in Bolton West) are activists with Patriotic Alternative who have reached an electoral pact with the English Democrats. PA itself is not yet registered with the Electoral Commission. A further ED candidate in Lancashire, Steve Morris in Bury South, is a longstanding English Democrat who has fought many elections.
Contrary to ‘anti-fascist’ hype, there has never been any secret about this electoral pact, there are no ‘false flags’, and indeed Craig was proudly wearing a ‘Free Sam Melia’ badge (produced by H&D editor Mark Cotterill) during our campaign work!
We began the day in Leigh town centre, handing out leaflets and speaking to local voters. It was very encouraging to find that so many voters were enthusiastic about Craig’s campaign and about the central issues raised in his leaflets.
After a quick break for lunch, we moved on to canvass an estate just south of the town centre, where again local residents were keen to show their support. There is clearly a powerful reaction building in towns like Leigh against the years of betrayal by the major parties, especially on the central campaign issue of immigration.
We don’t yet know how this reaction will be expressed at the ballot box, in the short term. But as H&D readers will realise, this isn’t about short term results: it’s about building the campaigning infrastructure required for a new era in British politics.
The old gang parties are dying: the future belongs to racial nationalism.
French authorities ban nationalist youth group GUD
Groupe Union Défense, a long-established nationalist organisation founded by students in 1968 and revived by a new generation in 2022, was banned yesterday by the French government, at the instigation of Gérald Darmanin, interior minister (French equivalent of the UK Home Secretary).
GUD is perhaps best known in recent years for its very well organised annual event in memory of the nationalist activist Sébastien Deyzieu, who was killed during a confrontation with police in 1994. It is one of several European nationalist groups who have been prominent in resisting the tide of Putinist propaganda and supporting Ukraine’s valiant resistance.
English readers will remember Darmanin for his disgraceful behaviour in 2022, when he was responsible for allowing gangs of non-European thieves to disrupt the Champions League final at the Stade de France. An inquiry by the French Senate condemned Darmanin in the strongest terms:
“It is unfair to have sought to blame supporters of the Liverpool team for the disturbances, as the interior minister has done, to deflect attention from the state’s inability to properly manage the crowd and suppress the action of several hundred violent and organised delinquents.”
Nominally from a conservative background, Darmanin has sold what is left of his soul to President Emmanuel Macron and his ‘centrist’ government led by the half-Jewish, homosexual Prime Minister Gabriel Attal.
After the banning order, GUD Paris issued the following statement:
The dissolution of GUD Paris was pronounced this morning in the Council of Ministers by Gérald Darmanin. Prisoner of an obsession bordering on neurosis, the Minister of the Interior continues his crazy policy of repressing the nationalist scene.
We shall not dwell on the fallacious reasons attempting to legitimise the dissolution of our movement: somehow, the servile officials of the Ministry of the Interior seek to justify the unjustifiable. However, they are fooling no one, and only highlight their instinctive recourse to lies and their formidable amateurism in matters of ‘intelligence’.
For 56 years, the Groupe Union Défense has been in every battle, at the forefront of political and student struggles, always on the front line. We, nationalist activists, having taken up the name of GUD Paris in 2022, are proud to have followed in the footsteps of the ‘black rats’ who preceded us, and hope to have proven ourselves worthy of them. [H&D note: The black rat is GUD’s cartoon symbol, invented by the movement’s co-founder Jack Marchal, whom our assistant editor met in Paris more than 25 years ago.]
Following the example of our elders and aware of what we must pass on to future militant generations, we will continue the nationalist and revolutionary struggle. Until we win, or until the sun dies.
Julian Assange is no hero
His strangely assorted fan club of ageing hippies, libertarians, and Putinists have greeted Julian Assange as a hero today, after the Wikileaks founder was released from prison following a plea bargain with US authorities.
Assange admitted breaching the Espionage Act, but having already spent five years in an English prison awaiting extradition, was allowed to fly home to Australia.
Due to Hillary Clinton being among the most famous victims of data published by Wikileaks, some H&D readers will be tempted to see Assange as “our enemy’s enemy” – but he is no friend of British nationalists, and he is no hero. Nor is he any sort of champion of “free speech”. There are many people in Europe (including in the UK) who, unlike Assange, are imprisoned solely because of expressing their opinions, but neither Assange nor his fan club ever lifted a finger to defend the likes of Sam Melia, Vincent Reynouard, or Ursula Haverbeck.
We should never forget that Assange eagerly published the home addresses of British National Party members, thus putting their families at risk from physical attack or intimidation from “anti-fascists”.
No doubt this (like his other “leaks”) had the blessing of Assange’s allies in the Russian intelligence service.
Wikileaks acted for years as the de facto partner of Putin’s espionage network. It was entirely fitting that Assange faced conviction and imprisonment under the Espionage Act.
At no time did Assange act as a bona fide investigative journalist. His method was simply to obtain vast quantities of data (sometimes with the help of Russian intelligence) and then publish it, without any assessment of its value, and without any consideration of those whose lives he turned upside down.
Unfortunately the “dissident right” in the UK and US contains many who would fit Lenin’s appraisal as “useful idiots” – useful that is for “anti-fascists” and for the Kremlin. They are certainly no use to nationalism.
The rational nationalist response to Julian Assange would be to say: good riddance to bad rubbish. Let us hope that he never sets foot in the UK again, and that we hear no more of this cynical, irresponsible opportunist.
95-year-old Ursula Haverbeck faces ANOTHER 16 month prison sentence
A court in Hamburg today confirmed another 16-month prison sentence against the 95-year-old German scholar and publisher Ursula Haverbeck, after several days of appeal hearings that began on 7th June.
(In the photo above, Ursula is discussing an earlier case with her lawyer, Wolfram Nahrath.)
Ursula’s ‘offence’ is to have raised questions about the orthodox version of 1940s German history (a history which she lived through, unlike the vast majority of today’s Germans). This latest sentence was increased from 10 to 16 months, due to Ursula’s courage in using the trial to repeat her questions and her interpretations of German history. The implication is that in true Stalinist fashion, today’s German courts expect a nonagenarian defendant to recant – but to her great credit, Ursula refused to play their game.
This month she appeared in court in Hamburg (a journey of more than 130 miles from her home) in relation to a conviction that dates back to 2015. Appeal hearings in the case were delayed several times, partly due to a backlog of cases during the pandemic. Additional hearings took place on 12th June and today (26th June).
Ursula has repeatedly been charged (and convicted) since 2004 for questioning the alleged extermination of six million Jews in purported homicidal “gas chambers”: an alleged mass murder presumed by orthodox historians to have been carried out on the orders of Adolf Hitler – even though these orthodox historians have never been able to produce the slightest evidence for such orders, nor establish how and where the murders took place.
German courts refuse even to discuss the evidence concerning this alleged “Holocaust”. They frequently impose jail sentences on dissident historians, scientists, and publishers.
The German-Canadian Ernst Zündel was deported to Germany in 2005 and arrested on arrival. He was held in Mannheim prison for exactly five years until his release in March 2010, having also been imprisoned from 2003-2005 in the USA and Canada awaiting deportation.
The scientist and historian Germar Rudolf was extradited from the USA to Germany in 2005 and imprisoned until 2009. Many other countries including France, Austria, and Russia also criminalise historical revisionism, but the Federal Republic (today’s occupied Germany) has some of the most severe punishments.
Ursula Haverbeck herself served a jail sentence in Bielefeld from 2018-20, and is due to serve a further jail sentence confirmed by a Berlin court in 2022, as well as this latest 16-month sentence imposed today. The main difficulty in enforcing these two sentences seems to be that few prisons (or even prison hospitals) have appropriate facilities to accommodate a 95-year-old prisoner.
Among the last survivors of the wartime generation, Ursula Haverbeck has ensured – by her remarkable tenacity, intelligence, and courage – that the pursuit of historical truth continues, in defiance of politically-directed courts and enemy-occupied governments.
The mainstream German news report above (even though made by establishment broadcasters) cannot disguise the disgraceful state of German justice, which now seeks to impose a further 16 month jail sentence on this brave nonagenarian patriotic lady.
The version above has English subtitles, and the version below has Spanish subtitles.
Casino politics and lack of honour – Sunak’s Tories and Farage’s Reform UK show they are unfit for office
Rishi Sunak’s Conservatives and their main challenger on the ‘right’ – Reform UK leader Nigel Farage – have dragged UK politics to a new low: a level of dishonour that combines farce and tragedy.
First the farce. Every day now brings a fresh story of senior Tory officials, MPs, or others in close contact with the Prime Minister, having placed bets on the election date. Now of course all this could be pure coincidence and they might not have been acting on inside information! Police investigations must eventually establish the truth.
What we already know for certain, is that had these people been professional footballers or involved in the management of a football club, and had placed bets on football, they would automatically face a lengthy ban, regardless of whether it could be ‘proven’ that they had cheated in any way.
The reason should be obvious. But for those close to Rishi Sunak, their first thought as the election approached wasn’t “how can I apologise to the British people for the mistakes of the past five years, and promise to do better if re-elected?” No – their first thought was: “how can I line my pockets for one more time, before being turfed out of office?”
With the Tories in total collapse, it’s understandable that many lifelong Tory voters are turning to Nigel Farage and his apparently radical ‘right-wing’ party, Reform UK.
But the truth is that Farage himself is dishonourable on a level that dwarfs the petty cheating and incompetence of Sunak’s team.
During and immediately after the Second World War, a new stereotype entered British culture and was often portrayed in comedy shows of that era. The “spiv” was a man who sought to make a fast profit out of others’ misfortunes, in an age of rationing and shortages. In real life, a disproportionate number of “spivs” were Jews – as was well known to the public at the time and has been established by modern historical research.
Following the so-called “big bang” liberalisation of the City of London in the mid-1980s, a new generation of spivs entered British life. While most of these operated within the law, they also operated with absolutely no regard for the UK’s national interest. The young Rishi Sunak profited from hedge fund speculations against UK banks during the financial crisis of the 2000s. And long before that, Nigel Farage’s first career was in the London Metals Exchange: his career was only modestly successful compared to Sunak’s, and eventually his commodities brokerage Farage Limited went bankrupt.
Farage’s blatantly dishonest spivvery has been in the political rather than the financial world.
His biggest con is his pretence of being anti-immigration. The slavishly pro-Farage channel GB News and much of the press have collaborated in this deception – but the truth is that Farage has always “welcomed immigration”, as he once told the European Parliament. Farage’s team promoted the idea of Brexit to UK-based Indians (including restaurant owners) on the basis that leaving the EU would mean that the UK could replace European workers with Indian, Bangladeshi and Pakistani workers.
And so it has turned out: with an extra helping of Africans added on top.
Farage and Reform UK now promise not to end immigration, still less to reverse the tide of immigration, but only to have a “one in, one out” policy: which of course would mean for the most part replacing White Britons and Europeans with non-White immigrants. Last year, for example, this Reform UK policy would have meant admitting 600,000 migrants.
None of this should come as any surprise. Farage is fundamentally committed to the toxic ideology of “free market” capitalism, which is essentially anti-nationalist, pro-immigration, and anti-White.
Those who are serious about ending immigration have two parties who fortunately are not standing against each other, and who in a small number of constituencies are offering voters a genuine patriotic alternative – the British Democrats and the English Democrats. Each of these parties is run by honest leaders who are genuinely committed on the immigration issue. Unfortunately they are standing in fewer than twenty constituencies, but they are sending a clear signal of the direction that UK politics could and should take in the post-Conservative era.
Could Farage and Reform UK be at least a step in the right direction?
No: because they are basically crooked.
Even aside from the immigration issue, Farage has shown himself to be untrustworthy on two other central issues of 2024.
Just a few weeks ago, Reform UK entered a pact with Traditional Unionist Voice, the party led by Jim Allister KC which promises to take Northern Ireland along with the rest of the UK into a genuine Brexit, rather than allowing a border in the Irish Sea – a trade barrier separating one part of the UK from the rest.
This sea border has come about because of a treacherous deal negotiated by Rishi Sunak’s government with the misnamed ‘Democratic Unionist Party’ earlier this year. At first it seemed that Reform UK agreed with TUV on a common platform of a real Brexit and no sea border. A pact was publicly announced on this basis.
But no sooner had the campaign begun than Nigel Farage unilaterally tore up this pact. In two constituencies – including the one being contested by TUV leader Jim Allister – Farage instead endorsed DUP candidates and betrayed his supposed TUV allies.
Quite incredibly, Farage was thus endorsing two of the very people who sold out Brexit and sold out the people of Northern Ireland.
He was able to do this because Reform UK has no genuine existence as a political party. It is a business rather than a constitutional party, and as the owner of that business, Farage can do whatever he likes.
He can issue a manifesto whose tax promises are the most dishonest and innumerate of any party; he can recruit or expel candidates on a whim; and he can make up policy as he goes along, to impress his gullible target audience of ageing reactionaries.
And now Farage has committed his foulest betrayal. Not content with betraying White Britons over immigration, and not content with betraying his erstwhile allies in Ulster, Farage now betrays those who are fighting at Europe’s frontier, those who are paying the ultimate price to defend their nation from Kremlin aggression.
Again, this came as no surprise to long-term Farage-watchers. He has for more than a decade been the most dangerous type of Putinist propagandist.
As serious historical students of propaganda know, the most insidious propagandists are not those who blatantly endorse every aspect of those whose interests they (deliberately or otherwise) serve.
Whether in the Second World War or the Cold War, the greatest success for a professional propaganda agency was to get someone to parrot treachery without it being obvious treachery. Thus, communist dupes in the West didn’t openly call for surrendering to Stalin, Khrushchev or Brezhnev – they called for “peace”. Moscow’s front organisations often had names such as “World Peace Council”.
Moreover, it’s been a longstanding practice of invaders and their proxies to call for “peace”, once their initial advances have ground to a halt. “Peace” of this sort rewards the invader and allows his forces to become firmly entrenched.
Those propagandising for an aggressor will do anything to avoid the central issue. They will point fingers in every direction, sometimes contradicting themselves, but always seeking to undermine firm action against the invader. And they will ignore basic historical and political facts.
So it has been with Farage. During 2010-14 (at a time when he was a relatively minor figure in UK politics) the then UKIP leader appeared seventeen times on Putin’s propaganda channel Russia Today.
RT itself was proud to claim that Farage “has been known far longer to the RT audience than to most of the British electorate”.
And he swiftly rewarded his Moscow friends. During an earlier Ukraine crisis in 2014, when Putin grabbed Crimea, Farage typically maintained that the Kremlin despot had been “provoked” and absurdly insisted that the European Union had “blood on its hands in Ukraine”.
The reality was (and is) that NATO and the EU had been far too weak, and it was their unwillingness to risk “provoking” Putin a few years earlier, when they failed to respond to appeals from Ukrainian nationalists for an alliance against Moscow, that encouraged Putin’s imperialism.
Ever since then, Farage’s cynical tactic has been to utter a few words distancing himself from Putin’s dictatorial behaviour, but then going on to endorse his foreign policy.
In 2014, asked which world leader he most admired, Farage replied: “as an operator”, Putin.
His short-lived successor as UKIP leader, Diane James, went further, describing Putin as one of her political “heroes”. Yet another UKIP leader, Paul Nuttall, agreed that Putin was “generally getting it right in many areas”.
In 2017 Farage again made token comments distancing himself from Putin’s imprisonment of journalists, etc., before saying that Putin was “a strong national leader”.
In 2018 speaking to an interviewer from Newsweek magazine, Farage was even more explicit in his policy of surrender to the Kremlin: “We would have done better to recognize that there are some big issues on which we have a shared interest with Russia. Instead, our foreign policy approach to Russia has been very confrontational.”
Following Putin’s notorious interview with Tucker Carlson earlier this year, Farage argued that the West should have discussed a “deal” with Putin immediately after the invasion. In other words, right from day one, Farage’s policy was not to resist the invader. His policy instead was one of craven surrender: a “deal”.
Absurdly, Farage’s argument was (and remains) that “our foreign policy approach to Russia has been very confrontational.” Not that the Kremlin was being “confrontational” by invading its neighbour, but that others had been “confrontational” in not bowing to Putin’s expansionist agenda.
Last week during his interview with the BBC’s Nick Robinson, Farage expanded on this theory.
We must remember that Farage is a man of limited formal education. He has never studied Russian or Ukrainian history; he has no personal experience of the region; and he has absolutely no academic training in military history, intelligence history, or strategic studies.
Yet like golf club reactionaries everywhere, as they prop up the bar and regale their fellow Rotarians, Farage is an instant expert and never admits that he might ever have been wrong about anything important.
Once again (as he has repeated since that interview) Farage made token, insincere, and weak comments distancing himself from Putin’s invasion. But he then went on to claim that the invasion had somehow been “provoked” by the West.
Essentially, therefore, Farage’s message can be paraphrased as – yes, the war is unfortunate and wrong, but the basic fault lies not with Putin but with the West: we should have given Putin most of what he wanted without war, and then the invasion wouldn’t have been necessary!
True strategic genius from the man who went straight from school to the London Metals Exchange without pausing to obtain an education.
When faced by an aggressor, says Nigel, don’t “provoke” him; don’t stand up him; instead – surrender in advance!
What Farage has never understood (or in his contrarian pursuit of American-style conspiracy theory, simply doesn’t want to understand) is that Putin was responding to a perception of Western weakness, not Western ‘provocation’.
The Kremlin misread signals and misread the determination of Ukrainian patriots.
Putin was correct that the Western response to his invasion would be slow. What he didn’t realise was that Ukrainian resistance would be so effective that his troops would grind to a halt, far short of their objective, and that an alliance of his neighbours, stretching from the Baltic to the Black Sea, would put some backbone into the cowardly ‘West’.
Farage – the ultimate political spiv – will never understand true patriotism. His ‘free market’, quick-profit mentality is fundamentally anti-nationalist and anti-White. He betrays his own political allies without a second thought.
To Farage, all this is ‘clever’ politics. To the rest of us, it is rank treachery which confirms that he is unfit for office.
Nigel Farage and Reform UK will doubtless play their part in destroying the Conservative Party – but if he and even a tiny group of Reform UK MPs are elected to Parliament, they will rapidly self-destruct.
Farage and his ilk are not and never will be part of a ‘transition’ to a better, patriotic politics. They are part of the problem: wholly unfit for office.
