UKIP 'lunatic fringe' - Heseltine
[The pot calling the kettle black, from "Tarzan" himself, I'm glad to hear Heseltine is depressed, relieved in fact -g-]
The UK Independence Party is a "lunatic fringe" whose policies spell disaster for Britain, a Tory former Cabinet Minister has warned.
Lord Heseltine, deputy Prime Minister during Margaret Thatcher's premiership, was speaking ahead of the announcement of the European election results.
He attributed much of the UKIP's rise to media coverage, but conceded that Tories must shoulder a lot of responsibility for negative attitudes towards Europe.
"Lady Thatcher began the process. Although she actually shared more of our sovereignty with Europe than any British Prime Minister before or since, incomparably more, from her gut she didn't like them," he told GMTV's Sunday Programme.
"So there were all these emotional outpourings, anti-europeanism, euro-scepticism, xenophobia. Undoubtedly that shifted the position of the Tory Party."
He added: "There is no surprise to me that it has ended up with a lunatic fringe, quite frankly, UKIP's policies are just incomprehensible.
(What????!?!! Is Heseltine a complete idiot? I suppose the current fishing policy in Europe is just "OHHH so Wonderful". What a stupid thing to say..pb)
"They've suddenly become populist, they've got big names. They say the most simplistic things. It's really immensely depressing."
He credited current Tory leader Michael Howard with recognising the "enormous damage" years of division over Europe had done to the party.
Despite being eurosceptic himself, Mr Howard had "tried to balance the books" by bringing Tory former chancellor Kenneth Clarke and former prime minister John Major on board as advisers.
"The problem is there is a steam-roller at work," Lord Heseltine said.
"The problem is there is a steam-roller at work" Ho Ho Ho, and I'd love to help drive it -g- pb |
