What do we think of Nigel Farage’s Brexit Party?

Thank you GracesGran nice not to be shot down after giving my opinion.
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Makes for sensible discussion in a non inflammatory way which has got to be a good thing.

There is a worrying link between NF's surge in popularity, his speech in Washington and Trump's visit to the UK. I'm drawing on information in The Times yesterday and putting two and two together, i.e. NF and Trump and Trump and BJ.

The Sunday Times reports that Trump may host a private dinner party on his arrival in the UK. Friends of Trump say he is eager to meet up with Boris Johnson, who is described as a friend. According to sources familiar with the arrangements, NF could also be on the guest list after he met Trump at the Conservative Political Action Committee Conference in Washington last month

Farage's friends Aaron Banks and Andy Wigmore are expected to visit Trump's team in Washington prior to the visit to the UK. Government officials fear the trip will be used to embarrass TM and I'm not surprised!

Anyway, isn't NF supposed to be at work in Brussels as he is an MEP? He's out and about drumming up support for his new party when he should be representing the people in his constituency.

I think my post has been misconstrued by some. The point is that it doesn't matter what race or ethnic origin you are from, you probably have more in common with the law abiding citizens (no matter what language they speak or what customs they practice) than with the criminal and violent sectors of your community or city. The true divisions are not those of one area being Pakistani or Muslim but of certain areas being unliveable in because they are controlled by criminals.

I doubt that Farage has ever been crass or inept; he is far too skilled a politician to do that. I think it was totally deliberate and played both to his relationship with Trump and his core base back here.

You make many good points Urmstongran. However, as I read them I can only think "so why did this Conservative government not manage this better?" and "Why did this Conservative government take away the money for that?" The Tory ideologists tend to behave like the old slave owners did, seeing all people as potential workers, the "merchandise" use to increase their wealth. Spending on their comfort or their integration into a community is a cost they have decided is unnecessary.

Propaganda uses "othering" so that the privileged section of the community can retain power and wealth. If we want to sort out the challenges posed, people must be treated, not as cogs or widgets in the great Tory machine but as human beings. This will mean dropping the ideology that tells us we must have austerity.

Under Tory misrule, austerity is just a time in which the poor can be dehumanised and the rich made even more wealthy.

Good morning Grandad1943 I promised last night to read up on Nigel Farage’s ‘Oldham’ comments and get back to you.

I think that NF is being disingenuous to an American audience by citing the problem as black v white as this feeds into the narrative over there. Perhaps it was an inept way to make a point.

However for the people who live in such towns, there are undeniable tensions. Yet to speak of them tars one as being racist.

These facts about Oldham were in the Guardian newspaper yesterday and demonstrate the seismic shift in population:

“In Werneth, a tangle of terraces a mile south-west of Oldham town centre, 23.4% of the population was white at the time of the 2011 census, down from 43.2% 10 years earlier. Meanwhile, the Pakistani population grew from 38.2% in 2001 to 48.6% in 2011. The Bangladeshi community also swelled in that decade, from 11.6% to 17.8%.”

Now, I’m all for accepting that people are people and nice people are within all different cultures. But deep divisions between for example, Indian and Asian communities are a fact of life. Add into the mix young male hotheads and tensions can boil over as demonstrated by the surge in knife crime in London. Obviously drug culture plays a big part there.

Sorry this is too long a post and I don’t want to bore everyone with my opinions so I will finish by saying many second and third generation from original immigrant families do go ‘home’ to marry poorly educated villagers and then come back here to bring up their children. I know personally of professional people who have done just that as the ‘old ways’ appeal to them for various reasons. I used to think (naively) why not just go over to Bradford or wherever your extended family live to find a bride? Some never learn English so integration is nigh impossible. Witness to this are the large tracts of government leaflets say for the NHS where a dozen different languages are printed out. (If we went to their countries this wouldn’t be reciprocated). The NHS provides an interpreter for out patient appointments, funded by the taxpayer and that’s a fact.

I think what I’m trying to say (badly) is that NF was crass but not wrong. Immigration is fine provided it is funded properly and managed sensibly. Those who live in the gilded, gated sections of our society are not the ones trying to integrate!

I grew up in handsworth in Birmingham in the 70s/80s.

The divide there then was between the Indians and the Pakistanis. Blacks and whites got on well together. However the divisions were palpable

I still have family there and visit regularly. The only divide now is between black gangs. This is purely based on post codes and has a hell of a lot to
Do with the drug gangs.

The white and Asian communities are completely safe from the murderous gang violence as long as they don’t inadvertently get in the firing line.

I imaging it’s a mirror of what Is happening in London. Young black men killing other young black men.

Can I also add re divides when my aunt died 5 years ago she had lived in her house since 1952..middle of handsworth, she was an elderly white Christian and when she died every neighbour so Muslim, Sikh, black Baptist stood outside their houses as a mark of respect while the coffin passed by.

Made us cry
Good people can integrate and get on well.

Found this...

I memory serves me...I recall Tony Blair visiting Bradford where there were divisions between two 'races' who simply couldn't abide each other. Tensions were at an all time high and one report suggested that a wall be built to keep the warring factions apart.
It's nothing new.
In my home town the African community had their own streets and areas, shops and clubs where others were not welcome. So did the Chinese population but they were never troublemakers.

Oldham were not best pleased, apparently.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/apr/28/nigel-farage-raises-hackles-oldham-by-saying-town-split-on-racial-lines

Grandad
Going back to your Oldham issue. What had this to do with Brexit?
I don’t think Pakistan is in the EU.?

Grandad1943
I think it is difficult for those who do not live in these towns to understand the strains that parallel societies create. Similarly those law abiding people who live on estates plagued by gangs and lawlessness no go areas are created.

Very true Trisher but the problem is it must not be spoken about. It reminds me of the censorship prevalent during the height of the Chinese revolution, and apparent in North Korea where everything is portrayed as Rosy when it most evidently it is not.
Why not get it from under the carpet and shake out the issues whether it is feral Brits or parallel living Asians. Why the taboo?

Joelsnan, there may well be cultural divides in many areas of the towns and cities of Britain. However, those divides are among British people, and no section of those in those divides are about to "go away."

Farage highlights his perceived divisions within British society but puts forward no solutions as to how those cultural divides can be reduced or even eliminated.

Instead, Farage talks up racial tensions as somehow in his warped thinking he believes that will be to the benefit of his Brexit party. In that, he is acting in the same manner as the National Socialist Party did in 1930s Germany. In that also he is placing at risk the ethnic stability that has been such a success in Britain since the 1960s.

Should that ethnic stability begin to fail, then we may well all witness British citizens against other British citizens and that could become much more than words on social media sites.

Racism seems to be at the core of the Farage Brexit party as it is in his former UKIP party. Rich grounds for Tommy Robinson and his henchmen.

There's nothing wrong with telling the truth but let's face it there are areas in every town and city where there is a divide. How many GNers live in an area where there are regular fights on the street and in the loal pub? Culturally some of the families I met when I was teaching were as far removed from me as Asian families. They accepted violence and petty crime as a normal part of life.

Sadly Grandad1943 He is telling the truth. There was even a TV programme last year showing the divide in Bolton, Lancs. and this is repeated throughout many northern former mill towns and cities.
This issue has polarised over the years why, who knows. Although I worked with a modern British Pakistani girl, who like many went to Pakistan with her sister, both married cousins, both returned pregnant and both husbands followed back to the UK. She stated that Pakistan had moved with the times a bit whereas the elders in the UK remained very conservative. I did not see her for around 15 years, but after working abroad, I joined a gym and she recognised me it the swimming pool of all places. Another thing she did say was that her family came from Lahore and there were many that had come to UK from the villages and were not as educated as those from towns so re created villages where they could retain their language and lifestyle
What is wrong with telling the truth?.

Lily65, Quote [What connects nige and the desire to leave the EU with Oldham?] End Quote.

Lily65, the answer to your above question is in the posted link and what has been stated in the recent pages of this thread.

All will be revealed there.

What connects nige and the desire to leave the EU with Oldham?

as in the connection?

Oldham, Nigel the link please?

Urmstongran, hopefully.

Grandad43 ?
Till tomorrow mi amigo.

Urmstongran, sadly I will be working in the office all day tomorrow, so will not be on this forum until late evening (if at all) to continue our joust.

Lilly65 the above link is for some reason not working, please try this one:-
carmonreport.com/world-news/oldham-streets-split-along-racial-lines-claims-nigel-farage/

I’ve not read it yet. It’s late (an hour ahead in Spain) so I’ll look it up tomorrow.

Lily65, A report on the Farrage speech can be found by following this link:-
carmonreport.com/world-news/oldham-streets-split-along-racial-lines-claims-nigel-farage/