UKIP AND THE HATEMONGER
REVEALED: Bully abusing MP outside Commons... ..is Far Right activist posing with Ukip chief
THE far-Right mob leader hounding an anti-Brexit MP outside Parliament has links to Ukip.
James Goddard was in a gang of agitators that surrounded Tory MP Anna Soubry on Monday, calling her a ‘Nazi’ and a ‘traitor’.
The Daily Mail can reveal that he was photographed with Ukip leader Gerard Batten at a farRight demo last year.
Since December, Goddard and his rag-tag bunch of followers have harassed and verbally abused MPs, campaigners and TV journalists at Westminster.
His appalling behaviour has prompted more than 140 MPs to demand that Scotland Yard chief Cressida Dick tackles the ‘deteriorating public order and security situation’ outside the House of Commons.
The Mail has established that Goddard is one of a growing number of extremists who have become close to Ukip. He was pictured last June smiling alongside Mr Batten at a rally calling for the release from jail of Tommy Robinson, founder of the English Defence League.
The photo underlines concerns about Ukip’s lurch to the farRight since Mr Batten became leader last February. The MEP denies knowing Goddard.
Mr Batten’s appointment of Robinson as Ukip’s special political adviser led to the resignations of former leaders Nigel Farage and Paul Nuttall. Half of its representatives in the European Parliament followed suit.
In his resignation letter, West Midlands MEP Bill Etheridge branded the party a ‘vehicle of hate towards Muslims and the gay community’.
Goddard, 29, played a leading role at the rally last June and made a speech in which he said the UK was being governed by ‘hostile paedophiles’. It is unclear whether Mr Batten heard the speech, which was broadcast over loudspeakers. In other developments:
House of Commons Speaker John Bercow described the abuse and harassment of MPs outside Parliament as ‘a type of fascism’ and called for a change of policing policy;
The BBC and Sky News kept their leading journalists away from their usual broadcasting position outside Parliament yesterday after days of racist and misogynistic abuse;
Staunch Brexiteer Jacob Rees-Mogg leapt to Miss Soubry’s defence;
The officer in charge of policing Westminster admitted he
‘There will be more to come’
did not know if calling someone a Nazi is an offence.
Mr Etheridge said: ‘Unfortunately, Gerard has associated the party with this kind of thing. It is the very tip of the iceberg and there will be more to come.
‘It is a great shame. They are allowing people to label Brexit supporters as thugs and it has to stop.’
The far-Right Westminster mob’s links to Ukip emerged as the Metropolitan Police announced plans to step up its operation around Parliament in the run-up to next week’s Brexit vote.
Deputy assistant commissioner Laurence Taylor said the force would be ‘enhancing the policing presence’ after Miss Soubry was branded a Nazi during TV interviews and then jostled as she walked to the Palace of Westminster.
Mr Taylor said officers had been told ‘that if they witness criminal behaviour then there is an expectation that an arrest will be made’.
Scotland Yard is assessing whether any crime was committed by protesters who hurled abuse at Miss Soubry and campaigners Owen Jones and Femi Oluwole.
A Ukip spokesman said: ‘Mr Batten is photographed with thousands of people every year.
‘This does not make him responsible for the actions of any of those individuals.
‘He does not know who he [Goddard] is. There is no relationship there.’