From the ‘Man on the Inside’
My good friend Simon Budden has written in to give his account of the event on Friday. Here he tells us what happened from inside the building.
By Simon Budden
While Hadleigh stayed outside during the protest at the Bath Royal Literary and Scientific Institute (BRLSI), I managed to make my way into the building and I remained there throughout the protest and the speeches that eventually took place.
I have little to add to Hadleigh’s account of the evening, which is very accurate and records how an evening of speeches (to which all candidates in the European Parliament elections were invited – including the BNP) was protested against but took place, albeit, in a reduced form.
Long past the original start time and with only four candidates, the event eventually began. I should note that, due to the protest, the audience consisted of approximately 80-90% BNP supporters and the candidates were only given 5-10 minutes to speak with (unfortunately) no time for questions.
Thus, the audience received speeches from the candidates of the English Democrats Party, Libertas, the Christian People’s Alliance and the British National Party (in order).
The English Democrats Party’s speech outlined their main (only) policy, that of fighting for an English Parliament. This seemed out of place given that the European Parliament elections were the focus of the evening.
Libertas presented themselves as a pro-EU party with their single policy of reforming the European Union. This is mainly by means of empowering the elected representatives of the Parliament, as opposed to the appointed Commission. This seemed reasonable and honest; although I profess that I am not an expert on Libertas.
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The Christian People’s Alliance, similar to that of the English Democrats candidate, spent a large portion of time describing what his party was and didn’t give any European policies.
Finally, the British National Party candidate took his turn to speak. He began by commenting that he had recently returned from Gibraltar, claiming that the Gibraltar Chronicle and the Gibraltar Broadcasting Corporation had been “very sympathetic” to what he had said.
He also laid out his stance as pro-U.K. and (in contrast to other candidates) found it necessary to point out that the suit he was wearing was made by an Indian gentleman and that his account was Chinese, before she sold her company.
Moving on, he informed the audience that there was absolutely nothing that the United Kingdom could do in order to stop immigrants from entering the U.K., due to the European Union. Immigrants who only take from the welfare state, and contribute nothing. Added to this, was the promise that the BNP would eradicate all foreign aid, instead helping pensioners.
The BNP candidate finished with the claim that the European Union is very wasteful. He gave the figure that each MEP costs £125,000 per year, although the sources were not elaborated on and no description was given of the work that MEPs undertake.
The BNP candidate then received a standing ovation from many in the audience, all of whom, I suspect were BNP supporters before the speech. A number of people (author included) neither stood, nor clapped.
Overall, the impression that I came away with was that the BNP thought of the evening as a victory for themselves, in the guise of the democracy. They had beaten the protesters and been allowed to speak. However, had the evening gone as planned and had many people from many parties taken part, I feel that there would have been a different outcome.
The lack of time of questions (along with the large BNP contingent) meant that we were unable to tackle any of the claims made. This would have been avoided, had the public been allowed to enter the building.
Since it hasn’t been mentioned here yet, the following quote was used twice to sum up a part of the spirit inside the building.
“I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your rights to say it”
Most people attribute it to Voltaire, but there is some debate. However, I wish the event could have been summed up with another quote:
“The right to be heard does not automatically include the right to be taken seriously” – Hubert H. Humphrey
May 27th, 2009 at 5:35 pm
I think it’s really good.
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