Luvvie Emma attacks ‘cake filled, misery laden’ Britain
I’m European, she claims in bizarre tirade against us quitting Brussels
SHE has never been afraid of spouting her London metropolitan elite views on matters of political importance.
So it is no surprise that Emma Thompson waded into the referendum debate with a bizarre rant against the UK.
The outspoken darling of the Left sparked outrage yesterday by deriding Britain as a ‘tiny cake-filled misery-laden’ island which must stay in the European Union.
She was accused of ‘doing our country down’ after telling journalists that the UK was nothing more than a ‘little cloud-bolted, rainy corner’ of Europe.
The Oscar-winning actress said she felt ‘European’, even though she lived in the UK and said it would be ‘madness’ for Britain to leave the EU.
She suggested we should want to ‘take borders down, not put them up’.
The 56-year-old was promoting her new film Alone In Berlin in the German capital, when she waded into the issue – just days before David Cameron is due to meet European leaders in Brussels to hammer out the final details of his renegotiation deal.
Asked for her thoughts on the possibility of a Brexit, Miss Thompson held forth for several minutes about how people would be ‘mad’ to vote to leave.
‘I feel European even though I live in Great Britain, and in Scotland as well, you know,’ she said. ‘So of course I’m going to vote to stay in Europe, are you kidding? Oh my God, of course. It would be madness not to; it’s a crazy idea not to. We should be taking down borders not putting them up.’
Then in answer to a question about the migration crisis, she then went on to apparently disparage the UK, saying: ‘I’m living in Europe, of course, as it were, well a tiny little cloud-bolted, rainy corner of sort-of Europe, I mean really, a cake-filled, misery laden, grey old island.’
In the press conference about the film, a screen adaptation of Hans Fallada’s 1947 novel about a German act of resistance to the Nazis in wartime Berlin, Miss Thompson could only bring herself to refer to England in a disparaging fashion.
She spoke of how ‘England’s fascistic side’ affected the UK’s view of Germany and the Second World War. She said: ‘If you consider I was born in 1959, it’s only 14 years after the war ended. All the films I saw while growing up about Germans were about the war and us being marvellous and beating the Nazis. I was completely brainwashed, I realise.’
Citing Sebastian Haffner’s Defying Hitler, she added: ‘It wasn’t until I started reading about it, and reading about that many Germans felt they had been invaded by the Nazis as much as anyone else. That was for me was key.’
Miss Thompson, who is said to be worth £30million, is a lifelong Labour supporter who said last year that she believed Jeremy Corbyn was ‘very sound and intelligent’ and could win the next election. Last night, campaigners for Britain to leave the European Union branded her an ‘overpaid Leftie luvvie’ and said her remarks were ‘ incredibly disappointing’ and ‘utterly defeatist and negative’.
Tory MP Stewart Jackson said: ‘I really couldn’t give a monkeys what overpaid Leftie luvvie Emma Thompson thinks about Brexit.’
Fellow Tory MP Steve Baker, chairman of ‘ Out’ campaign group Conservatives for Britain, added: ‘ It’s always incredibly disappointing to see a star doing our country down. We are much greater than this.’
Daniel Hannan, a Conservative MEP tweeted: ‘ In what sense is Britain a “tiny little island”, Emma Thompson? Geography? Economics? Diplomatic reach? Which are the bigger islands?’
And Ukip leader Nigel Farage told the Huffington Post UK: ‘This is utterly defeatist and negative. We believe in Britain, and that we can thrive as a self-governing, independent nation.’
Miss Thompson and her husband, fellow actor Greg Wise, are known for being outspoken on social and political issues. She gave a controversial interview to Newsnight in September saying Britain had failed to take in thousands of refugees from Calais because of ‘racism’. She told the programme the UK’s response to the refugee crisis in Europe was ‘really shaming’.
Last year she campaigned with Greenpeace against Shell drilling for oil in the Arctic and penned an open letter to Tesco to voice her ‘profound objections’ to one of its stores being built near her £3.5million home in leafy West Hampstead, north London.
Mr Wise – who describes himself as a ‘profound f***ing Socialist’ declared last year that he and his wife would refuse to pay tax until those involved in the HSBC tax avoidance scandal went to prison.
Miss Thompson’s remarks on the EU stand in stark contrast to those of fellow movie star Michael Caine, 82, who last month endorsed the campaign to get Britain out of Europe. He said the country should no longer be ‘dictated to by thousands of faceless civil servants’ in Brussels.
Other stars have weighed in with their views on the EU debate. Sir Michael Gambon made clear he also believed Britain was better off in the EU last month. He said: ‘I don’t think we should leave the EU, it would be wrong. I don’t think it’s right.’
Miss Thompson and Mr Wise have a 15- year- old daughter Gaia and adopted their son Tindyebwa, a Rwandan refugee in 2003.
Disappointing to see a star doing our country down
I’m living in Europe, of course, as it were, well a tiny little cloud-bolted, rainy corner of sort-of Europe, I mean really, a cake-filled, misery laden, grey old island