UKIP – Small Problem In Redditch

As more and more UKIP activists were discovered to have, shall we say, odd views about the world around them, the party told anyone who would listen that their procedures for vetting candidates were being tightened up. There would be personality tests. The antediluvian element would be weeded out. The racists and homophobes were no longer welcome. They need not apply.

Well, someone forgot to tell those in the West Midlands satellite town of Redditch, which elected one Dave Small last Thursday as a Councillor. Small, still up for a contest at the age of 81, had hardly been elected than his Facebook pronouncements were being pored over and found wanting. And what was found was too much even for the Farage fringe.

On the subject of gays, he was of forthright if unfortunate mind: “I refuse to call them gays, as what has gay to do with Perverts like Elton John and Clair [sic] Balding who get their jollies in such disgusting ways. to sum up, they should not allowed to be married, they should go back to the closet”. And to give Dave his due, he has admitted to being homophobic.

He was equally upfront – and equally wrong – when it came to followers of The Prophet: “Fact, we had most eradicated T.B from this country, then with the migration for [sic] Muslim country’s [sic] its [sic] near epidemic proportions. But mustn’t say anything, it might be considered racist”. As opposed to being mindless, scaremongering crap, no doubt.

This, though, is all in the past, and does not disbar Small from taking his Council seat: as the Redditch Standard notes, “All councillors have two months to sign official papers before taking their seat and as Mr Small has yet to do so he is not bound by the council's code of conduct”. Then the BBC gave him the chance to express some contrition, so one might have thought he’d think again.

But this thought would have been sadly misplaced, as he told the Beeb “I shall never apologise to the poofs and perverts and certainly not the foreigners. The people of Redditch voted for me, I will stand my ground”. The world might have moved on in the past 60 years, but “he said he did not have to adapt with the world and those who were offended could ‘please themselves’”.

Sadly for Dave Small, those who were offended included UKIP, and so he has been expelled from the party just five days after being elected. This is believed to be a record, although were it to be followed by more of the same, few would be surprised. Small, in the meantime, denies being racist, because he has “a lot of black friends”. As opposed to Jewish friends, that is.

Dave Small was stuck in the past. His now former party still has one foot there.