English Democrats prospective MEP in court for electoral fraud

The English Democrats' political brain, Steve Uncles, was in Dartford Magistrates Court today after being charged with 10 counts of electoral fraud.

Uncles has contested a great many elections for local councils, Westminster, the EU and ironically the Police & Crime Commissioner elections and failed consistently. He tried to do a deal with Sinn Féin to change English Democrats policy on Northern Ireland to hand the province over to the republicans in exchange for a donation. He's abused, bullied and defamed political rivals and been threatened with legal action over his behaviour a number of times. He's been in the press more than once for offensive behaviour and attracted criticism for mocking the death of a mentally ill Labour supporter.

During last year's local elections in Kent, the English Democrats fielded a number of candidates that many believed didn't exist and the police were called in to investigate. One of these was "Anna Cleves" (Anne of Cleves) who is of course an English historical figure and supposedly lived in the house that was knocked down to build Steve Uncles' house. Another candidate was "Steves Uncle" who Steve Uncles publicly admitted was a pseudonym.

As the police have pressed charges it's safe to assume these people were fake, along with a number of others and as they've pressed charges against Steve Uncles - something they rarely do with z-list wannabe politicians - it's safe to assume they have some pretty strong evidence that he was responsible for them appearing on the electoral register and then on ballot papers. It is presumably the fact that these fake people were fraudulently entered onto the electoral register well in advance of the election so that they would qualify to appear on ballot papers that made the CPS think a prosecution would be in the public interest.

Uncles pleaded not guilty to all 10 charges today and will now appear at Maidstone Crown Court on March 14th for a preliminary hearing. The maximum penalty for each offence under the Representation of the People Act is a £5,000 fine and 6 months in prison.

Labour criticise Nigel Farage's choice of venue for public meeting

The Labour Party are so desperate to undermine UKIP's surge ahead of the EU elections in May that they've sent out a press release criticising Nigel Farage for holding a public meeting in a building that got funding from the EU.

The Sage in Gateshead was partly funded by the EU Regional Development Fund (ERDF) which, according to Labour, means that Nigel Farage and UKIP are hypocritical. One of the Labour EU election candidates and TUC secretary, Judith Kirton-Darling, says that the £10m of our own money that the EU graciously gave us back to help build the Sage and other local landmarks is proof of the north east's important relationship with "Europe" (they mean the EU).

It costs us about £53m per day to be a member of the EU and we get about £1.6bn per year back via the ERDF. That's less than 8.5% of what we pay in. There is no such thing as "EU money" because the EU doesn't generate wealth, it leeches off the wealth of member states and loses approximately £1 in every £4 it is given to waste and fraud. The small percentage of our own money the EU gives us back isn't something to be grateful for, it should shame the politicians who allow so much of our money to be spent abroad when so many are in need at home.

Clegg -v- Farage

Nick Clegg has challenged Nigel Farage to a debate on the LBC radio station on whether we should stay in the EU or leave.

Farage has raised the stakes and told Clegg to get Cameron and Miliband on as well and make it a proper leaders' debate.

Even though Nigel Farage is the most popular party leader (on the odd occasion polling companies ask) and most people in the country want out of the EU, a debate on LBC would still be a tough gig because it's a London radio station and support for the EU and unfettered immigration runs high in a city where only 45% of the population are "white British".

That said, any credibility Nick Clegg might have had in an EU debate is destroyed by the fact that as a former EU commissioner he is obliged to promote the EU at all times and never to criticise the EU or its institutions publicly or he will lose his EU pension. And that's before you get onto his vacuous claims about millions of jobs and world peace relying on the EU.

Nigel Farage will undoubtedly wipe the floor with Clegg on the EU and any other topic for discussion that comes up because both Clegg and the Lib Dems are wrong on pretty much everything, as evidenced by their rapid decline into obscurity in opinion polls and at the ballot box. Although it would be nice to hold out for the other two europhile leaders to get in on the act it's not going to happen because whilst Clegg has nothing to lose, being about as popular as a dog poo sandwich, it would be electoral suicide for the other two to try and debate Nigel Farage. By saying no to a one on one with Clegg in the hope that Cameron and Miliband will join in, Farage will look weak. He should accept the offer, wipe the floor with Clegg and use Clegg's rare show of backbone to shame Cameron and Miliband into live televised debates with the three main parties plus the Lib Dems.

There is a poll on the LBC website on who you think would win the debate between Clegg and Farage. It's a fairly close-run thing but Farage is out in front at the moment.

EU has mobile roaming in its sight again

The EU have got mobile phone operators in their sights again, aiming to abolish all roaming charges across the EU by 2016.

Research has shown that almost half of people travelling abroad don't use the internet on their mobile phones when travelling in the EU and a quarter don't use their phones at all.

Mobile phone roaming is an obvious reminder that the EU isn't one country and the EU don't like any reminders that a United States of Europe doesn't exist (the EU Commission's vice president, Viviane Reding, has called for it again this week).

Mobile phone operators are pumping billions into upgrading infrastructure to take advantage of 4G technology and they need to recoup that cost through their customers. It costs money to provide mobile services to customers from another network and operators need to be able to charge for that service so they don't have to pass that cost on to their own customers.

All the mobile phone operators have add-ons that will allow you to use your phone in the EU and elsewhere at a reduced cost or as part of your inclusive package for a daily or monthly fee. Three allow you to use your inclusive minutes, text and data (subject to conditions) in most of the countries where they own a mobile phone network. There is also an EU cap on roaming call, text and data charges anywhere in the EU.

Consumers have options and protections, forcing mobile phone operators to create the illusion of a United States of Europe with the unilateral abolition of roaming charges is both unnecessary and counter-productive. Allow them (encourage them, even) to make their own bilateral agreements on roaming and protect the interests of their own customers.

Barroso tells BBC it could be impossible for Scotland to join the EU.

Emperor Barroso has told the BBC that it would be "extremely difficult, if not impossible" for Scotland to become a member of the EU if it declares independence from the UK.

The SNP's stance on the EU is frankly bizarre - they want to swap a British union dominated by Scots and Scottish interests for a European Union in which it would be a tiny, insignificant voice. Despite being told several times that their belief that they will automatically be given EU membership is incorrect, they continue to plan for a future in which Scotland breezes into the EU and nobody makes them join the €uro.

Personally, I would be happy to see Scotland declare independence. The Scottish people never wanted union with England in the first place and they never took to Britishness the way the English did. The relationship between the two countries has always been strained with the 700 year old Battle of Bannockburn being invoked in most "debates" about Anglo-Scottish relations as if it was still a raw wound. The battle for independence should be won honestly though, not by bluff and bluster which is what the SNP is coming out with now.

As the independence referendum gets closer, the wheels are coming off the SNP's wagon. The Tories, Labour and Lib Dems have all pledged to block any currency union with Scotland which was one of Alex Salmond's key pledges for an independent Scotland along with EU membership, a budget surplus, not taking on a share of the British national debt and some other pie in the sky stuff. Most Scots know they can't afford independence even if they want it and the SNP's habit of making promises it can't keep won't help change their minds.

UK second in Wythenshawe & Sale East

UKIP's John Bickley came second in yesterday's by-election in the Labour stronghold of Wythenshawe & Sale East.

A hate campaign by Labour and BNP activists that saw voters and activists abused and intimidated and criminal damage at UKIP's office in Sale wasn't enough to see off UKIP's surge from fifth place in the last election in Wythenshawe & Sale East to second.

UKIP saw the biggest increase in vote share followed by Labour and the BNP whilst the Lib Dems and Tories experienced huge losses. The Lib Dems, Greens, BNP and Monster Raving Loony Party all lost their deposit.

Party	Votes	%	+/-
Labour	13,268	55.4%	+11.2%
UKIP	4,301	17.9%	+14.5%
Conservative	3,479	14.5%	-11%
Lib Dems	1,176	4.9%	-17.4%
Green	748	3.1%	N/A
BNP	708	3.0%	+0.9%
Monster Raving Loony Party	288	1.2%	N/A

It's Independence Day in Wythenshawe East & Sale

Polls open today in the Wythenshawe East & Sale by-election after what is possibly the dirtiest by-election campaign we have ever seen, with an unholy alliance of Labour and BNP supporters abusing UKIP activists and voters and committing criminal damage.

The police have had to be called to UKIP's campaign headquarters in Sale four times during the campaign because of the hate campaign which has seen a generator stolen from the office, graffiti daubed on the shutters, stink bombs thrown at the office and harassment and abuse of UKIP activists and voters. People in Wythenshawe & Sale have been ordered by Labour and BNP activists to take down UKIP posters from "our houses".

UKIP has seen by-elections where the local Labour mafia believe they own the whole area and have a god-given right to rule it for all eternity but this is the first time that such wanton criminality has been openly used against the party in a by-election campaign.

The result of the election has almost certainly been decided by postal votes, which Labour - with the help of the corrupt trade unions - always has stitched up (literally). With a big turnout there is a chance of toppling the Labour mafia in Wythenshawe East & Sale or at the very least of giving Labour the bloody nose it deserves.

EU cancer drug rules killing children

The EU isn't just killing baby giraffes, according to the Institute of Cancer Research they're killing children with cancer as well.

The ICR says that the EU's scheme of class waivers for cancer drugs should be abolished because it lets companies restrict who their cancer treatments can be used on and too many companies won't test their drugs on children. The ICR says this means there are plenty of cancer treatments out there that could be used on children but can't be routinely prescribed because of the class waiver and children are dying as a result.

Around 1,600 children are diagnosed with cancer each year and about 260 of those die, some of them unnecessarily because of these class waiver rules. About 331,000 adults are diagnosed with cancer every year and that's where the money is for the drug companies. Testing on children is not only expensive but a clinical trial that results in the deaths of children is hugely damaging reputationally. The drug companies are given exclusivity on their treatments if they test them on children but that obviously isn't enough of an incentive so the answer is either to offer better incentives or punish them for not testing on children. They make so much money that punishment is unlikely to work and at the end of the day we can't do without the product they're selling so more incentives are probably the best option. What form those incentives might take I don't know but if we want to cut the caner death rate in children someone needs to come up with something fairly rapidly.

Of course, the blame for poor access to some cancer drugs can't be laid entirely at the drug companies' feet because the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (laughably abbreviated NICE) has a poor record of investing in life threatening or changing treatments in England. It is because of NICE's penny pinching that we can't get some cancer treatments that are routinely prescribed abroad and even elsewhere in the UK. It's because of NICE that elderly people in England go blind when their sight can be saved because the cancer drug that cures the most common cause of blindness in old people is too expensive for English people. The drug companies absolutely need to be taken to task for not making their drugs available for children but the daily injustices meted out by NICE also need to be challenged.

Demographic Instability

A deeply unsettling article recently published in the Daily Telegraph predicts the second age of machines. Unlike much of futurology the thesis of the article, namely that many service sector jobs will be replaced by machines that exhibit a substantial degree of artificial intelligence, is not at all far-fetched, or that far away.

In fact, we can see the process is already starting: at the low skills end of the market, supermarket checkout staff have already been largely replaced by automated checkouts. Increasingly, the advertising you see on the internet and elsewhere is decided by machines that learn and predict your desires, aspirations and fears. In politics, we are entering the era of the data-driven election, already credited as being instrumental in the re-election of President Obama in the United States.

And it doesn't stop there: in three years, Google hope to be testing it's driverless cars - which have already driven huge distances in the United States with a far better than human safety record - in the UK.

Ah, you say, every technological revolution that comes along destroys jobs but in the end creates new ones: just so, but does it create jobs for everyone?

History shows us that the answer, very sadly, is no. The deindustrialisation that accelerated from the 1970s onwards stripped many male manual jobs permanently from Western economies, leaving whole classes of society with poor prospects and social problems that blight our society to this day. The second machine age will be no different, with the carnage this time being inflicted on low and mid-skilled service level jobs. Meanwhile the highly skilled, particularly those with highly numerate skills in science and mathematics, will see their wages continue to rise and wealth will be increasingly concentrated even more so than it is today.

For a society to survive the huge disparities that the second machine age will produce will require a very strong level of social cohesion, as it will necessitate very large wealth transfers from the rich to the poor. Meanwhile, the political class have been busy building precisely the opposite to what is needed, reducing social cohesion and lowering skills through mass unskilled immigration - much of which from Islamic cultures actively hostile to the scientific enquiry needed for wealth creation - as well as dumbing-down education and encouraging the dominance of an international metropolitan superclass which has little or no allegiance to the ordinary people of this country.

The only silver lining to these otherwise highly destabilising developments is that they are actually highly favourable to UKIP. It is often said by the complacent LibLabCon that demographically speaking, UKIP is doomed, as we represent the elderly and the economically insecure. Well, the elderly and economically insecure are about to get a whole lot more numerous. Fundamentally, the new machine age is a new phase in the neo-medieval age this blog has always argued we live in. That age  is about to turn pretty nasty for most people, and we had better have solutions when it does so.

Switzerland votes to end open borders with the EU

Switzerland has narrowly voted to end its free movement agreement with the EU and restrict immigration from EU countries after 50.3% of participants voted to take control of their borders back from the EU in a national referendum.

Since 2007, EU citizens have been allowed to live and work in Switzerland with equal access to jobs and vice versa. About 80,000 people per year have moved to Switzerland from EU countries in the last 6 years which represents around 6% of Switzerland's population. The total permanent immigrant population in Switzerland is about 23% and 82% of Switzerland's population growth is a result of immigration. Two Swiss cantons have a majority immigrant population: in Geneva, the "native" Swiss make up just 37.8% of the population and 48.9% in Basel-Stadt. Switzerland has the highest percentage immigrant population in the world.

Unemployment in Switzerland is fairly low at about 3.4% of the workforce and much lower than its 1997 peak of around 5.4% but it has been volatile over the last few years and understandably there is concern amongst Swiss citizens that jobs are going to EU immigrants when there are people in Switzerland without a job.

The pro-EU lobby tells us that if we swapped EU membership for a free trade agreement like Norway or Switzerland then we would be subjected to "fax democracy" where we are forced to adopt EU rules without any say on making them. EFTA countries are involved in the decision making process so it's factually incorrect anyway but this decision shows that far from having no say on the rules that apply to our country, we would have absolute control over them. The EU says that Switzerland must have open borders with the EU but the Swiss people say they don't so they won't.

UKIP has a policy of introducing Swiss-style referenda that would give us the same ability to pick and choose which EU rules we want to comply with. The Swiss rely on the EU for over half their exports which puts them in a much weaker position than the UK because even the fiddled EU export figures show that we export less to the EU than we do to the rest of the world and that percentage is decreasing year on year. If the Swiss have the courage to rattle sabres with the EU from a relatively weak position then why shouldn't we from a strong one?

Who knew there was an EU directive on interbreeding giraffes?

Copenhagen Zoo is planning to put down an 18 month old giraffe because EU rules on interbreeding mean that they can't allow it to breed with the giraffes they already have.

Animal rights campaigners are trying to save the animal but the zoo have been unable to relocate it. They intend to kill the giraffe with a bolt gun, dissect it and feed the meat to other animals.

Even baby giraffes aren't safe from the EU!

Update:
Marius was put down this morning.

Update 2:
Some anti-UKIP tweeters have criticised this post because the rules on interbreeding are made by the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria which isn't part of the EU. The EAZA make have made the rules but they are implemented by EU Directive 1999/22/EC which became law in England in 2002 (2003 for Scotland, Wales and NI) and further clarified in the British government's Zoo Expert Committee Handbook.

Give your postal vote to the Post Office not the Labour Party

In response to the discovery that the Trade Unions and Labour Party Liaison Organisation is collecting postal vote applications and passing the details on to the Labour Party, UKIP has taken out this newspaper advert:

Cameron shows his contempt for the public and parliament - alcohol minimum pricing.

I just wrote to my MP via www.writetothem.com - may be you should too? (use your own words!)

Dear Simon Kirby,

I was very disappointed to see that the coalition government have brought in minimum alcohol pricing by the back door.

Some time ago David Cameron had made this a 'flagship policy', but (apparently) in the face of public (and so MP) opposition performed a U-Turn and dropped it. (http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23346532)

Now it is reported that rather than dropping it, a way was sought to bring it in with out allowing the public (or MPs) to have a say. (http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26040550)

I cannot express how disgusting I find this behaviour by the government in sidestepping the public and MPs.

David Cameron has a record of abusing his position, which he acknowledges - so much so that he sought to support an EU referendum law, as he knew his word alone would be trusted by very few voters.

This 'back door' introduction of law is a very EU method of working (as per working time directive being brought in via 'health and safely' because UK had an opt-out on 'employment' regulations).

I hope you are as mortified by this evasion of parliamentary accountability as I am.

Of course, by adding this to his record of deceitfulness and deviousness, the public will be reassured that any referendum promised by David Cameron will only ever deliver (by fair means or foul) the result that he wants.

Yours sincerely,

Paul Perrin

First published at http://free-english-people.blogspot.co.uk/2014/02/cameron-shows-his-contempt-for-public.html

Help UKIP win the Wythenshawe & Sale East by-election

Voters will go to the polls in the Wythenshawe & Sale East by-election next Thursday with a chance to make history and elect UKIP's first MP.

UKIP candidate John Bickley is a local businessman who grew up on a council estate in Wythenshawe. He has worked for EMI Records, MCA Records, Paramount Pictures, Universal Studies, Psygnosis and Sony and is now in high tech startups. Westminster needs real people who have made their own success, not millionaire lawyers and lifelong politicians and former Labour man John Bickley is just the sort of person we need.

There is still time to help out in the by-election campaign either financially or practically. If you want to help UKIP win the Wythenshawe & Sale East by-election you can find details on the UKIP website.

Tory troll Joshua Bonehill-Paine charged with making malicious communications

Internet troll and Tory, Joshua Bonehill-Paine, has been charged with making malicious communications and will appear in court this week.

EDL supporter Bonehill runs the Daily BALE website and has been behind a large number of attacks on UKIP members, left wing campaigners and their family members. His attacks are usually based on entirely fictitious stories and are intended to whip up hatred from his far right followers. He has previously admitted to being behind a number of high profile attacks on UKIP members, saying that it was his job as a Conservative.

Bonehill was arrested in 2011 for using his Conservative Party membership card to break into a police station in Somerset and steal a uniform and then assaulting police officers who tried to arrest him.

Conservative Party member was part of a child kidnap gang

A Tory defector to UKIP who resigned after he was found to have been a member of a gang that kidnapped a child in Karachi in 2004 has made the headlines today after the press found out about his shady past.

Mujeeb Bhutto defected from the Conservatives to UKIP and became the party's Commonwealth spokesman last year. When his conviction for kidnap and blackmail was discovered he resigned and went back to the Tories with his tail between his legs. The Tories have since said that his membership renewal was not accepted but he received an email from the Conservative Party purporting to be from David Cameron thanking him for joining and an email from the chairman of his local constituency association welcoming him back to the party.

The media gleefully reported the "UKIP Comonwealth spokesman" who was part of a kidnapping gang this morning even though he said he had rejoined the Conservatives. It wasn't until the emails confirming he had rejoined the Conservative Party were published on Guido Fawkes that the BBC backtracked and reported his new Tory membership although the newspapers continue to mislead readers by portraying Bhutto as a UKIPper when he's a Tory.

German Foreign Minister says UKIP is a threat to peace in Europe

The German foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, has claimed that UKIP and other eurosceptic parties are a threat to peace in Europe.

In a speech in London in which he blames the First World War on European countries not talking to each other rather than Austria-Hungary and Germany invading their neighbours, Herr Steinmeier appears to call for UKIP and eurosceptic parties in other countries to be banned:

History before the First World War was a history of not talking to each other, of nationalisms which could no longer be [tamed] by reason. These dangers have to be forever banned.

In 2011 the EU claimed to have been responsible for 50 years of peace in Europe and was later shamefully given the Nobel Peace Prize despite the continent experiencing almost constant armed conflict throughout those 50 years and the only genocide in Europe since the second world war happening under the watch of EU peacekeepers.

There has been no peace in Europe for 50 years and if Herr Steinmeier is suggesting that the only reason Germany hasn't started a third world war is because it can control the rest of Europe via the EU rather than through armed conflict then that's very worrying and would indicate that Germany needs to be quickly disarmed for the safety of Europe and the rest of the world.

Corruption costs EU economies €120bn per year

The EU Commission has released the findings of a study into corruption in the EU (no, I don't think they were being ironic) which shows that fraud and bribery are costing the collective economy of the EU €120bn per year.

It isn't clear from the reports whether the estimated €4bn a year that is lost to fraud within EU budgets is included in this €120bn but presumably it isn't as an assessment of the level of corruption in EU institutions was dropped early on. It will come as no surprise that the report was accompanied by a call for the EU's fraud investigation department, OLAF, to be given more money. The report says that the quality of corruption investigations varies widely across the EU so calls for more powers and harmonisation will no doubt follow shortly.

Unsurprisingly, corruption was most prolific in Greece and Spain where between 60-69% of people said they were personally affected by corruption in their daily life. Romania and Croatia were next at 50-59% and Italy and Slovakia at 40-49%. The UK was low down the corruption list at 10-19%.

The Lords have killed David Cameron's EU referendum bill