As news broke that voters in the local elections had hollowed out Ukip’s already hollowed-out form, the party’s general secretary Paul Oakley tweeted: “About to go on @BBCr4today to get duffed up over the local election results. #BringIt.”
About to go on @BBCr4today to get duffed up over the local election results. #BringIt
— Paul Oakley UKIP (@PaulJamesOakley) May 4, 2018
Once on air, though, Oakley mostly did the duffing up to himself.
When Nick Robinson hinted that it was time Ukip gracefully retired, Oakley responded: “Think of the Black Death in the Middle Ages. It comes along and causes destruction and then goes dormant: that’s like Ukip.”
After a deathly silence, Robinson asked: “Can I just clarify, as the general secretary of Ukip, you just compared your party to the Black Death?”
“Absolutely, what’s wrong with that?” demanded Oakley. When Robinson, sniffing a rat, pointed out the global plague pandemic killed a lot of people (up to 200 million, including half the population of Europe), Oakley said: “It also led to economic growth and the Renaissance.”
Although Oakley made it clear he wasn’t planning to give a history lesson to the nation’s baffled breakfast-eaters, he couldn’t help answering the question on what parts of the Black Death he’d like to emulate.
“It got rid of servitude, basically,” he said. “It allowed people to go into the towns escape their landlords and create their own businesses. that sort of thing.”
A killer entrepreneurial policy for Brexit Britain. As Robinson said at the end of the interview: “No need to beat you up at all.”
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