Former UKIP leader and ‘Tommy Robinson’ superfan Gerard Batten has been barred from standing again as leader of the party. The NEC passed a motion on Sunday entitled “Gerard Batten has brought the party into disrepute by his actions and associations and should therefore not be allowed to stand for the leadership of the party.” He’s now fighting back with a Twitter poll…
UKIP’s NEC has now decided to extend the nomination process. Read their letter to members here:
With no MEPs for the first time since 1999, just a handful of councillors and only two full time elected officials (both in the Welsh Assembly), Gerard Batten’s remodeled NewKip is on its last legs. That doesn’t stop them launching the third leadership battle currently waging on, after the Lib Dems and the Tories, as former leader Gerard Batten announced his term had come to an end today. Now Guido brings you the runners and riders for the leadership…
Whoever gets it, there’s little chance UKIP will rise much beyond the 1% they currently sit at in the polls. RIPKIP.
UKIP leader Gerard Batten was flushed with embarrassment after he missed the start of his eve-of-conference talkRADIO interview with Julia Hartley-Brewer this morning for “personal reasons”. Her producer had already got him on the line when he disappeared. The prospect of Julia’s fearsomely tough questions clearly loosened his bowels. For a moment the producer thought they had been dumped. The subject matter of Julia’s cheeky question pushed the interview into a sticky situation. After passing that initial conversational blockage, the sit-down interview was back on a roll…
Nigel Farage is saying he will return as UKIP leader if Tory MPs don’t stop their Brexit sellout:
I never wanted a career in politics. I only ever wanted to stop the country I love being sucked further into a political and economic union which is most unnatural to the instincts of the majority of my fellow citizens. However, my own red line is that if Article 50 is suspended or delayed, I will have no choice but to resume campaigning in all parts of the United Kingdom. In March 2019, the current leader of Ukip, Gerard Batten, will reach the end of his term in office. Unless Brexit is back on track by then, I will have to seriously consider putting my name forward to return as Ukip leader. I never thought I would say that again, but the government’s sell-out leaves me with no choice. The latest Brexit betrayal must be reversed.
A warning to those Tory MPs worried about losing their seats…
Yesterday UKIP announced it won’t go bankrupt – contrary to predictions – after it raised £300,000 in donations to meet the costs of the Jane Collins lawsuit. The party also said a £175,000 legal bill had been met “by other means”. Nope, no idea either…
If upbeat new leader Gerard Batten is to be believed, UKIP’s roller coaster fortunes may once again be taking a turn for the better. The party says it has signed up 1,000 new members since Henry Bolton was ousted. Ambitious Batten wants to stand 740 candidates in May so that the party qualifies for a TV broadcast. Interm leader Batten is now expected to remain in place for at least a year rather than the 90 days mandated by the party’s rulebook. None of this answers the really important question. What’s Henry Bolton up to nowadays?
He’s on a skate fishing trawler off the Kent coast. In his first promo video since launching new one man party ‘One Nation’, Bolton is seen chatting to fishermen about EU regulations. The somewhat surreal video, posted on One Nation’s new YouTube channel (3 followers), includes staged shots of Bolton walking into a fishery, shaking hands and sitting on the trawler as workers throw fish back into the sea. There’s no sign of Jo Marney.
The logo needs some work…
MEPs resigning the whip, councillors going independent, membership despairing and disappearing – this weekend could be the end of UKIP. The UKIP NEC is meeting to decide the fate of their beleagured leader Henry Bolton. He is appearing on Peston for a potentially last interview as leader on Sunday…
UKIP have been counted out many times without being knocked-out. Is this the final count for the single issue party soon to be without an issue?
UKIP will announce the winner of their leadership election this evening at their party conference. Most people think it has boiled down to a two-horse race, overnight betting has seen Peter Whittle become favourite (4/5) and Anne-Marie Waters move out to second favourite (5/4). Has something leaked from the Electoral Reform Society’s counting room?
This is an existential vote for UKIP, former leader Nigel Farage says the party is finished if anti-Islam Waters wins. Most of the MEPs say they will go independent and party officials tell Guido they will quit as well. We’ll know if the party is over in a few hours...
I’m just getting ready… pic.twitter.com/Yqbt74tCAH
— george garbow (@forgefarbow) September 24, 2017
If Anne Marie Waters wins Nigel Farage says UKIP is finished and there is no future for UKIP if it is led by her. With most of the votes in and the count due on Friday her noisy supporters on social media are convincing themselves she will win. The bookies agree. Calling UKIP sources who are usually in the know it is clear no one really knows. Did her recently joined UKIP supporters register in time to vote? Do most ‘Kippers pay any attention to social media?
Guido has a hunch that Peter Whittle will win. Arron Banks’ Leave.EU has backed David Kurten. There is a surprisingly long list of candidates. The threat by the UKIP MEPs to resign en masse if Anne Marie Waters wins will surely have been noticed by ordinary members. If Anti-Sharia Anne Marie wins the UKIP rebrand at their conference this weekend will be colourful…
UKIP leadership hopeful Henry Bolton is challenging the candidacy of anti-Islam candidate Anne Marie Waters, accusing the party’s NEC of violating its rulebook by allowing her to stand. Bolton said:
“I believe the National Executive Committee’s decision to allow Anne-Marie Waters to stand in the party’s leadership election is in violation of the party’s Rules of Procedure… I have initiated this challenge in an attempt to preserve the governance and future of our party. There is little point in having Rules of Procedure if they are not applied…”
The party’s rules state that a leadership candidate must have been in “good standing continuously” for two years, but Waters was banned from standing as a UKIP candidate at the general election. Was a surprise that they let her on the ballot…
With Farage not running, a battle for UKIP’s soul is underway between the more classical liberal / libertarian old guard and populist anti-Islam elements who are accused of trying to infiltrate the party. As ever Guido gives you your runners and riders…
Paul Nuttall has won the UKIP leadership ballot and will replace Nigel Farage as UKIP leader, beating Suzanne Evans and John Rees-Evans.
Paul Nuttall – 9622 votes 62.6%
Suzanne Evans – 2973 votes 19.3%
John Rees-Evans– 2775 votes 18.1%
Rees-Evans almost managed to beat Suzanne Evans into third place despite being almost completely unknown before the contest. His social media presence was good and after walking out of a hustings he pledged to meet more UKIP members which may have helped his share of the vote. It seem that gay donkey rape comment didn’t hurt…
UPDATE: Peter Whittle is new Deputy Leader
UKIP leadership contender and donkey gay rape banter enthusiast John Rees-Evans stormed out of a hustings in Newport last night after laying into the party hierarchy. He was angry at being told he wasn’t allowed to attack other candidates and told Guido that it was “patronising the membership”. Rees-Evans was unhappy at the hustings process which “only goes as far north as Leeds” and is now free to accept his no doubt numerous invitations from UKIP branches. At least one person has endorsed his move:
What a team they might have been.
When Guido turned up at the UKIP leadership hustings last night his cover was nearly blown when Michael Crick ambushed him with a camera and asked if he was a kipper. Thankfully he managed to escape to take his seat.
Nuttall got the biggest cheer of the night and whilst almost every candidate said what the audience wanted to hear, Nuttall consistently delivered it the best. The former mayoral candidate Peter Whittle managed to praise Nuttall at every opportunity and the pair could be seen whispering like naughty children whilst the others were speaking. Could Whittle pull out soon to endorse Nuttall?
Highlight of the night was Suzanne Evans saying she supported an English flag on every house in Emily Thornberry’s street and Peter Whittle reiterating his policy that every school should fly the Union Jack and have a picture of the Queen. Don’t forget the Victorian world map.
John Rees-Evans of gay donkey rape banter told the audience everything they didn’t want to hear including the drop in membership and the party’s empty coffers. But channelling Trump, he talked up his business success and promised to turn the party completely around by adding a comment section to the UKIP website allowing kippers to propose policy. Guido already seems to provide this.
Bottom line: Evans strong but Nuttall seems more in tune with ‘kippers.
The social media profiles of UKIP’s leadership candidates show Raheem Kassam was far ahead of his rivals before he pulled out this morning. The best indicator of online campaign support was the twibbon, where supporters add a campaign slogan to their social media profiles. Raheem had 1,326 twibbons, dwarfing leadership favourite Nuttall’s 214 – and yet all the signs indicate that Nuttall will win. Despite the online support Kassam admitted this morning that one of the reasons for quitting was he couldn’t raise enough money: “While we raised enough for our deposit, and got over 200 assentors to my nomination, we could not raise enough for this to be more than a digital campaign run from SW1”. What does this tell us about the relative importance of digital campaigning?
This has implications for Leave.EU, the pro-Brexit campaign group set up by multi-millionaire businessman Arron Banks, which backed Raheem. Leave.EU claims their huge social media reach* helped create “an extraordinary mass movement, drawing in swathes of voters neglected by the main political parties.” Banks has hinted that this will be the kernel for a new “people’s movement”. Banks is confusing “likes”, “follows” and casual clicktivism with active support. Leave.EU bought Facebook “likes” essentially by buying traffic.
Digital campaigns which enable commitment; donations, offline meetings, phone banking and membership drives do actually achieve something. Campaigns which generate clicks, petition signings and social flag counts are just virtue signalling. The casual easy click is no more substantive or permanent than what is trending online at any moment. Guido speaks as someone who garnered a million signatures and emails in one campaign, Banks has not got the beginnings of a popular movement, he has captured the virtue signals of a moment…
*As Dominic Cummings rightly points out, Facebook’s algorithms mean that Leave EU’s half-a-million “likes” are just a form of digital dick-waving, they achieve nothing in terms of visibility or extending reach. Leave.EU has less than half as many Twitter followers as @GuidoFawkes…
Guido was in the Marquis of Granby pub earlier this afternoon when he eavesdropped on a Suzanne Evans campaign meeting with Patrick O’Flynn and Lisa Duffy. Paddy, the most high profile Kipper backing Suzanne and her effective campaign manager, was overheard to say he thinks she will come second. Which is an honest and realistic viewpoint, even if it is one Team Suzanne wouldn’t want to admit to holding publicly. Loose-lips sink ships…
UPDATE: O’Flynn confirms it.
@GuidoFawkes @SuzanneEvans1 we like to under-promise and over-deliver dear boy!
— Patrick O’Flynn (@oflynnmep) October 28, 2016
Suzanne Evans is 16/1 at the bookies behind clear favourite Paul Nuttall (1/4 on) and Raheem Kassam (8/1). She is crowdfunding her campaign to raise the £5,000 deposit needed to actually run – so far she has raised 30% of what she needs to stay in the race. Despite offering a bottle of champagne signed by Nigel Farage if you pledge £1,000, it seems to have stalled a bit and has raised only £10 in the last two days…
Front runner Paul Nuttall has begun his online campaign for the UKIP leadership, securing the public endorsement of MEPs Tim Aker, Bill Etheridge, Ray Finch, Johnathan Arnott, Jim Carver, ex MEP and legend Godfrey Bloom. UKIP council leaders Chris Wells (Thanet) and John Tennant (Hartlepool) also chip in their support. As far as Guido can tell Suzanne Evans has the public support of Patrick O’Flynn. So far Raheem has the public support of zero MEPs.
The campaigning for this mercifully short duration leadership election is, of necessity, happening online to a large degree mainly via Facebook. This morning the Facebook “Likes” for Paul Nuttall stand at 39,576, Raheem Kassam has 24,252 and Suzanne Evans is hot on his heels with 23,103. UKIP’s membership stands at approximately 39,000…
Forget the spin, Nuttall is going to win according to polling of councillors by Matthew Goodwin. His support is greater than all the other declared candidates combined. Despite Raheem running a characteristically energetic and noisy campaign he is in a distant third place…
Kassam is optimistic about his noisy online campaign’s reach and the rhetorical backing of Arron Banks turning into financial, and more importantly, organising muscle. There is a call centre owned by Banks in Bristol that could be used to his advantage. Assuming the ever fluid rules of the NEC don’t prohibit its use…
UPDATE: Taking a leaf out of Trump’s playbook, Raheem is questioning the sample size of the poll and whining that the media is lying, despite linking to the source, where it clearly says “we surveyed nearly 150 Ukip local councillors and 91 replied”. That is a representative survey of 1 in 5 of UKIP’s councillors nationally…
Bill Etheridge is the first to pull out of the the UKIP leadership race, endorsing his friend Paul Nuttall:
“I always said that if a candidate better suited to take this party forward emerged I would back down and support them. That candidate has emerged.
“Paul Nuttall is not only a personal friend and an honourable man but I believe he is the only person who can effectively unite our party after the recent well publicised problems we have suffered.
“I will be supporting Paul and giving him my 100% backing. I call on all other potential candidates to follow my example and withdraw from the race to allow Paul to go forward from here and unite our party.”
Would Suzanne or Raheem pull out if Nuttall made them a deal?
Expelled Tory MP, Richard Benyon, on the short three-day Programme Motion for the Withdrawal Agreement Bill:
“Whether you had three days, three weeks or three months debating this, you would not hear one original argument that we hadn’t otherwise heard in this process…”
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