UKIP news update

UKIP News review 5 March

Nationals
Freddie Forsyth in the Express has his take on the van Rompuy affair, and political hypocrisy

FORMER UKIP leader Nigel Farage stood up in Brussels and told EU President little Mister Rumpy that he had the charisma of a wet cloth. Rude but regrettably very true.
Over here we might shrug off some pretty robust language in politics and we do. But the Rumpy nearly fainted with shock and the serried ranks of expenses-fiddlers reeled like corn before the gale. On BBC’s Question Time the usual line-up of Wimps-R-Us did the same, affecting deep horror. Foremost among them, lips pursed as if sucking a lemon, was the oleaginous Peter Hain. I found that intriguing....

Over 200 years ago an outraged Lord Sandwich rose purple-faced in the House to shout at an opponent. “Wilkes, you will die either on the gallows or of the pox.” “That,” drawled John Wilkes without a pause, “must depend on whether I embrace your Lordship’s principles or your mistress.”
Terribly rude but what a put-down. We should have more like that, not less.

The Mail points out that Harriet Harman is doing all she can to protect little Jonny Bercow,

Labour was also accused of sheltering Speaker John Bercow from being deposed from his position. Miss Harman ignored pleas from backbenchers for a secret ballot to re-elect the Speaker after the General Election. Mr Bercow faces a separate challenge at the ballot box from UKIP leader Nigel Farage, who is standing against him in his Buckinghamshire seat.

However MPs want Mr Bercow to face a secret ballot before continuing as Speaker if he does see off Mr Farage.

The visit of the Dutch Freedom Party, Geert Wilders on an uinvitation from Baroness Cox and Lord Pearson, the UKIP leader gets some coverage. Bruno Waterfield, in the Telegraph points out that he could well become the next Dutch PM.
Toby Young also flags this up.
As does David Charter at the Times ,

The Dutch anti-Muslim politician Geert Wilders arrives in Britain today on the crest of an electoral triumph that could mean him entering government in a matter of months.
Mr Wilders’s Freedom Party made big gains in Dutch local elections this week, widely regarded as a dress rehearsal for the national poll on June 9.
He has been invited to the House of Lords by Lord Pearson of Rannoch, the UKIP leader, to show his controversial film Fitna.

As, for that matter does Geoff Meade over at the Independent

Today he was due to show the film to MPs and peers as a guest of UK Independence
Party leader Lord Pearson and crossbencher Baroness Cox. Lord Pearson has
condemned radical Islam as a "world domination movement".
There was no sign of any protests when Mr Wilders arrived at London's Heathrow airport this morning but demonstrators were expected at Westminster later.

And the early editions of the Evening Standard are running with the story as well, lifting their comments from a slightly aged interview with Lord Pearson,

In a pre-election interview with the Press Association last month, Lord Pearson described the Dutch politician as a "friend" and denied accusations that his own party was "far-right" or "radical", after it called for face coverings - such as the veil worn by some Muslim women - to be banned.
"Is it radical to wish to protect British society and our Judeo-Christian culture from the growing influence of radical Islam?" he asked.
"We are dealing here with a world domination movement - this is not just in this country - and Islam is different to our Western culture and civilisation in that it is a legal system, a political system and a religion and an ideology all rolled into one.
"There is no separation of powers, and it is all based on the Koran or interpretation of the Koran and therefore it is very different to us.
"Of all the minorities in this country it is the one that does not want to integrate - it makes that quite clear, and we see the living fulfilment of that in many of our inner cities where Sharia law is actually running."
Lord Pearson insisted his party was "absolutely non-racist" and made clear he was not referring to moderate Muslims.
But he claimed the political establishment was "asleep" to the expansionist aims of radical Islam.
"It is, in its high-minded, literati superficiality, turning a blind eye to what is happening with Islam in this country and elsewhere in Europe," the peer said.
"We have not spotted one of the basic tenets of Islamist expansion which is al-Hijra.
"Al-Hijra is the Islamic tenet of accepting your enemy's hospitality, getting in amongst him and living with him as a Trojan horse and then expanding afterwards."
Lord Pearson said Ukip was able to put such issues out for debate that otherpolitical parties would not touch, adding: "All I want to do is talk about it."

Other than that not much else,