Brexit Party to fight for Labour Leave voters
The UK’s Brexit Party came out fighting yesterday when it launched its general election campaign from a boxing ring in the shadow of Bolsover Castle in Derbyshire.
Bolsover is traditionally a stronghold for the UK’s main opposition party, Labour, but it is at the heart of the Brexit Party’s campaign as 70 per cent of residents voted to leave the EU in 2016.
Brexit Party leader Nigel Farage claimed there were five million Labour supporters for the taking in similar towns across the country when polls open on December 12.
“We are in Labour heartland, represented by Labour MPs decade after decade, generation after generation, but it is a Labour Party dominated by north London intellectuals. They have completely lost touch with ordinary people,” Mr Farage said.
“They are now a party completely committed to overturning what we voted for back in June 2016. I do not think a single Labour Leave voter should vote for that party in areas like this.”
Before the rally Mr Farage tweeted a warning shot to Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn.
“The Labour vote is our key target, they have been betrayed,” Mr Farage said.
He repeated that sentiment in another tweet afterwards. “Great start to our nationwide tour. The gloves are off in this campaign and we are going after Corbyn’s Labour,” he said.
Mr Farage has been urged to move to the sidelines by his allies in the ruling Conservative party who fear a split in the Leave vote could jeopardise efforts to take the UK out of the EU by January 31 next year.
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson also called on voters to back the Conservatives but Mr Farage yesterday dismissed calls to stand aside.
“Somehow Labour voters are all going to vote for the Conservatives, that’s what Boris’s team says. It is simply not going to happen,” he said.
“Right now I will not allow him [Mr Johnson] to masquerade deliver Brexit when it is anything but.
“We have to get Brexit done properly and the Brexit Party is the only choice.”
Mr Johnson will hope to win a Conservative majority in the election so he can break the UK’s Brexit deadlock and get his EU divorce deal through Parliament.
But Mr Farage said his party would run in almost every constituency unless Mr Johnson scrapped his deal.
The Brexit Party, which was founded this year, rejects Mr Johnson’s Brexit deal, preferring to leave the EU with no agreement on future relations in what the party describes as a “clean break”.
The party said leaving with a deal would mean continuing to follow some EU rules and holding years of negotiations on future relations.
The party will hold campaign events at 60 locations across the UK but Mr Farage, who has run for Parliament seven times without success, said he would not be a candidate in the election.
US President Donald Trump has urged Mr Farage to team up with Mr Johnson to form “an unstoppable force” but the prime minister ruled out doing a deal with Mr Farage.
Yesterday evening the British Parliament was dissolved and the parties are set to begin the election battle in earnest today.