Golliwog MEP Bill Etheridge resigns from Ukip because it is racist

I used to have fun with Bill Etheridge, He and his wife left the Conservative Party after they were disciplined for posing with golliwogs and putting the photos on their Facebook page.

They joined Ukip and Etheridge published a book:

In this fearless and controversial booklet, Bill Etheridge argues that the political and social elite have cravenly surrendered to the diktat of the Politically Correct dogma that has crushed free speech, smashed enterprise and reduced Britain to a mere shadow of its former self. Using personal insights and real life examples he shows how our political leaders can no longer be trusted and issues a powerful rallying cry for all lovers of freedom to stand up against the totalitarian bigots who have forced Political Correctness upon us.

He was later elected to the European Parliament and even stood for the Ukip leadership.

Today comes news that Etheridge has resigned from the party. In a letter to its leader Gerard Batten he says:

"The changes you have made have changed the party beyond recognition. 

"The party is now seen by large swathes of the British public as a vehicle of hate towards Muslims and the gay community... 

"For my part I wish UKIP well and leave with great sadness that the party I loved has left me and taken a different direction."

I think we can take Etheridge's resignation as final proof that Batten has taken Ukip to the far right.

Nicky Morgan's peculiar choice of publisher

The Loughborough Echo reports that Nick Morgan - secretary of state for education and the town's MP - has written a children’s activity non-fiction book about Loughborough during the Civil War.

Good for her, but it's the book's publisher that interests Liberal England.

In 2011 we blogged about the Bretwalda Books title "Britain - A Post Political Correctness Society" by Bill Etheridge. You can see its cover here.

When he wrote the book Etheridge was a Conservative, but he left the party after he and his wife were photographed with golliwogs on their Facebook page.

Today he is a Ukip MEP. He was last heard of last August, advising his new party's young activists to copy Hitler's style of oratory.

Bretwalda Books books is run by Rupert Matthews, who has provided this blog with much entertainment over the years.

Bill Etheridge latest

This just in...

A reminder to Ukip that the British laughed at Hitler

This morning I blogged about the claim by Ukip MEP Bill Etheridge that Hitler was a "magnetic and forceful public speaker" who "achieved a great deal".

As I said then, "to the British Hitler's performance always seemed ranting and laughable". Not for the first time, there is something strangely unpatriotic in Ukip's view of the world.

I looked first for an example of a healthy British attitude to Hitler in Charlie Chaplin's The Great Dictator.



And if that doesn't quite work for the modern viewer, here is a scene suggested by a reader in the comments to this morning's post.

Sir Roderick Spode was P.G. Wodehouse's parody of Oswald Moseley, but here he is clearly attempting to emulate the rhetorical style of the German dictator.

Bill Etheridge: "I suppose they'll be saying Hitler was a racist next"

The Mail on Sunday tells us:

Nigel Farage was facing a storm of protest last night after one of his MEPs was revealed to have coached Ukip candidates to emulate Hitler. 

Bill Etheridge described the Nazi dictator as a ‘magnetic and forceful public speaker’ who ‘achieved a great deal’ – and said the candidates should copy the rhetorical style deployed by Hitler at the Nuremberg rallies.

It seems this advice was given last weekend at a training event for young Ukip members planning to be council or parliamentary candidates.

So if your local fruitcakes march to the stage accompanied by the 'cathedral of light' they went in for at Nuremberg and then spends minutes staring at the audience before they start speaking, you will know who has been training them.

Of course, to the British Hitler's performance always seemed ranting and laughable. Perhaps Mr Etheridge has spent more time watching them than most of us?

This is not the first time Etheridge has graced the pages of this blog. He and his wife left the Conservative Party after they were disciplined for posing with golliwogs and putting the photos on their Facebook page.

He then had a book published by the Conservative Euro candidate Rupert Matthews, which featured a golliwog on it cover, Matthews seems to have done his best to hide this fact afterwards.

All of which reminds me of this moment from A Bit of Fry and Laurie...

Rupert Matthews: The East Midlands holds its breath

BBC News confirms that the Conservative Party has Doubts about Rupert Matthews and that those doubts are centred on the book that he published for the UKIP member Bill Etheridge - complete with golliwog on the cover.

Elsewhere, I rather like the way New Europe puts it:

Matthews was discovered to be a sceptic over the EU, but on precious little else.

That blog also quotes a source as saying that Helmer is threatening not to retire as planned and "foaming at the mouth" with anger.

How can they...? You can see where this is going.

Later. The Derby Telegraph says that Helmer will be delaying his resignation until around 15 January because of the uncertainty over his successor.

Will Rupert Matthews ever be an MEP?

Suddenly a stream of blog posts that would write themselves is under threat.

Because it seems the Conservatives are threatening to take the fish from my barrel by declining to nominate Rupert Matthews as the new MEP for the East Midlands when Roger Helmer stands down on the last day of 2011.

Or so Mr Matthews reckons. He told the Leicester Mercury:

"I sent off the relevant paperwork to the party about three weeks ago. 

"I should have received confirmation 10 days later but I've had no response. 

"Phone calls are not being returned, and my e-mails have not been responded to. 

"I don't know what's going on at the party end."

The Mercury quotes Tory high command as making a strangely non-committal response:

Party spokesman said there was no vacancy as Mr Helmer remained in his post. He declined to comment.

While Roger Helmer says:

"It's supposed to be a formality – the party must do the usual background checks and then issue a certificate ... 

"Unless he turns out to be an axe murderer or a child molester or has defected from the Conservatives to the Communist Party in the meantime, then he should get the seat. 

"But now central office is saying it's not as straightforward as that and that they could bring someone else in. 

"Rupert was selected as a Tory candidate at the last election by 3,500 party members, and 370,000 people voted Conservative in the East Midlands. 

"He has a democratic mandate. If the party proposes to give the seat to someone else, I would have to think very carefully about whether to resign."

I have reason to believe that it is not Mr Matthews' view that "The evidence for UFOs and for the humanoid creatures linked to them is pretty compelling" that worries his party. Nor will they be concerned at his belief that European Union Panzers may invade Britain, as that now seems within the mainstream of Conservative thinking.

No, if the Tories are worried about Mr Matthews it will be because of his association with UKIP's Bill Etheridge.

Rupert Matthews and the UKIP golliwog

We have seen Rupert Matthews as a lecture in the paranormal and warning of EU plans to invade Britain. It is time to look at his activities as a political publisher.

Earlier this month Political Scrapbook (from whom I have borrowed the photo) reported that a "golliwog book" was on sale at the Conservative Party Conference. That book turns out to have been Britain - A Post Political Correctness Society by Bill Etheridge, published by one Rupert Matthews.

It turns out that Etheridge and his wife were recently forced to leave the Conservative Party after posing with golliwogs on Facebook. They have since joined UKIP. And though it is not a "golliwog book", it certainly has one on the cover.

I am on record as being relaxed about golliwogs, but I doubt that Tory high command will be amused. If anything threatens Matthews' fledgling career in the European Parliament it will not be his paranormal interests or his vision of EU tanks rolling into London. It will be his sticking up of two fingers at David Cameron. 

There are signs that someone close to Matthews has recognised this. Etheridge's book does not appear among the political books on the website of his firm Bretwalda Books. And a video about it has recently been taken down.

But you can still read about it on the Bretwalda Books Facebook page:*

In this fearless and controversial booklet, Bill Etheridge argues that the political and social elite have cravenly surrendered to the diktat of the Politically Correct dogma that has crushed free speech, smashed enterprise and reduced Britain to a mere shadow of its former self. Using personal insights and real life examples he shows how our political leaders can no longer be trusted and issues a powerful rallying cry for all lovers of freedom to stand up against the totalitarian bigots who have forced Political Correctness upon us.

"Our political leaders can no longer be trusted." It's an odd view for a Conservative MEP to be promoting.

* This page has now disappeared too.