• 3 months ago
Panorama.S2014E37.The.Farage.Factor
Transcript
00:00On Panorama tonight...
00:04I am leaving the Conservative Party.
00:10UKIP have shaken the Westminster establishment,
00:13winning their first elected MP.
00:15It's nice to have a leader with whom I agree.
00:18It's early days though, isn't it?
00:23Their growing popularity is the biggest challenge
00:26to the established parties in a generation.
00:29They have given away our birthright
00:31and we are going to take it back.
00:36UKIP preaches accountability,
00:39so why are they so careful about what questions they will answer?
00:43It's not a press conference, it's a private meeting.
00:45OK, you can call it as you want.
00:47And we decide who's in.
00:49Migel Farage says he's a straight talker,
00:52so why have so many colleagues quit in disgust?
00:56Behind your back, he'll be stabbing you.
00:59I mean, Brutus has got nothing on Farage.
01:02I'm on the trail of the leader who says
01:05he's not like other politicians.
01:07Mr Farage, why won't you do a formal interview with us,
01:10a formal sit-down interview with BBC Panorama?
01:13What's the upside?
01:26This is the UKIP pyramid rolling to success.
01:30Early May, and across the country,
01:32UKIP's People's Army is gaining ground,
01:35with commanders like Albie Tebbet.
01:38Hello, hello, hello.
01:42He's a wealthy businessman,
01:44now putting his support behind UKIP in Romford.
01:48Politicians are more interested in their wages
01:51than how much money they get.
01:54Albie was a staunch Tory who retired from politics a few years ago,
01:59but Nigel Farage persuaded him back into battle.
02:03Why are you doing it?
02:05I'm doing it for the kids in this country,
02:07my children and my grandchildren,
02:09and for the ordinary people in this country.
02:11This country is still, in my opinion,
02:13one of the best countries in the world, right?
02:16Without any doubt. Where are you from?
02:18From Ireland, from Belfast.
02:20Well, don't you agree, then, that this is one of the best countries?
02:22Absolutely.
02:23That's right, that's why you're here, I suppose, isn't it?
02:25That's exactly why I'm here.
02:26So you know why I'm doing what I'm doing, don't you?
02:30Say yes.
02:31I do know why you believe what you're doing.
02:38UKIP is attracting new support from former Labour voters too.
02:45Like cafe owners Tony and Faye.
02:48Faye has MS, but her treatment centre is desperately short of funding.
02:56Faye, how are you?
02:57The couple think the government is spending too much on immigrants.
03:03My father and my mother came over here from Cyprus in 1957.
03:07They didn't come over here, let's say, getting any handouts.
03:10They came over here and worked for their living, you know?
03:15They never got handouts from no-one.
03:17But, like, now it's a different ballgame, isn't it?
03:19The minute they come over, they get somewhere to stay.
03:24I don't understand.
03:26Is UKIP the only party which is straight-talking?
03:29I think they're probably talking more common sense than everyone else, you know?
03:33At least, like...
03:35Don't get me wrong, I ain't got a problem with immigration.
03:38But, like, don't, let's say, use all your funds on immigration
03:43and you can't look after your own people.
03:50Immigration is now a big issue in British politics
03:54and Albie has a go at explaining UKIP's view.
04:06But not everyone is impressed.
04:14All they say, we welcome the Jews and Pakistanis into this country.
04:26Well, you don't have to swear, madam.
04:31No, sorry.
04:33If that's your attitude, you seem to be in a minority, madam.
04:37You seem to be in a minority.
04:39There's not many people who agree with you.
04:44That's what politics is all about.
04:46I welcome people of opposite opinions, right?
04:49I welcome that.
04:50But I don't welcome that sort of attitude,
04:52where she's misinterpreting myself.
04:54And that's where Nigel gets in trouble.
05:02Nigel Farage, the pint-drinking, straight-talking face of UKIP.
05:09They have given away our country.
05:11They have given away our birthright
05:13and we are going to take it back.
05:23He's moulded a fringe protest group into a political force.
05:32UKIP swept to victory in the European elections.
05:36UK Independence Party UKIP, 751,439.
05:42CHEERING
05:51But who exactly is this head of the People's Army?
05:56We've unearthed an old programme from the BBC Archive.
06:00It was never broadcast here, but if you're a UKIP supporter,
06:04you might already have seen it.
06:06Because Nigel made hundreds of copies and flogged them
06:10at a fiver a pop.
06:12He was eventually stopped by trading standards
06:15and ordered to pay compensation.
06:19He is one of three United Kingdom Independence Party MEPs.
06:24The programme shows his earliest days in Europe
06:27and the strong language he uses about its leaders.
06:31We're involved in a moment of history, Michael.
06:33We are indeed. Yeah.
06:35Shall we hit when he walks in?
06:37There he is. Wanker.
06:39No manners.
06:41That's the President of the EU Commission he's referring to.
06:48It's just a farce.
06:51Back then, he was offended by the EU excess.
06:55All that ready cash.
06:58Everyone's a winner with Europe.
07:00Everyone's a winner with Europe.
07:02There we are. What they didn't want you to see in the office is
07:05the loot, check fit and marvellous.
07:08Now, I'm not saying that all of this is wrong,
07:12but what I am saying is that on travel expenses,
07:15you should have to produce receipts.
07:21But he's not always so evangelical about transparency.
07:26I'm on my way to Ashford in Kent.
07:33In 2003, Nigel Farage established
07:36a National Party call centre in this building.
07:41It was intended to recruit new party members and raise cash.
07:45He has said it raised £400,000 for UKIP.
07:51But not all the money UKIP members donated here
07:54went to the National Party.
07:56So where did it go?
07:58We've discovered it was paid into a bank account
08:00controlled by Nigel Farage and an associate.
08:05Members of the party's ruling executives say that
08:08Nigel Farage kept them in the dark about how the money was spent.
08:15We were given figures that something in the region of
08:18£160,000 for the year 2005 had been raised,
08:22and yet the party received less than £18,000.
08:26Now, with the greatest respect,
08:28we could have run a few raffles and earned £18,000.
08:36There were concerns across the party that the regions
08:39weren't receiving a share of the money raised.
08:43What was happening was money,
08:46which would normally have been paid by cheque,
08:49it was being paid over the phone to Ashford.
08:52Now, we were supposed to be getting some of that money
08:54back to the branches and back to the region,
08:57and it wasn't happening. It was a black hole.
09:02So if the money wasn't being shared out across the regions,
09:06where was it going?
09:10We've obtained documents which appear to show that
09:13Nigel Farage's own branch in the south-east got the lion's share.
09:19His constituency spent far more in the 2004 European election
09:23than any other region.
09:28Much of that money came from ASH, the Ashford call centre.
09:35Perhaps not surprisingly,
09:37Nigel Farage retained his European seat.
09:41Critics say he used the national call centre
09:43to bankroll his own political campaign.
09:47I constantly banged on about integrity and transparency,
09:54and that was the key reason I joined UKIP,
09:58because I believed, unlike the other political parties,
10:01it had a wonderful opportunity to display those features.
10:05And you can imagine how disappointed, how upset I was
10:09when I found the opposite to be true.
10:17Nigel Farage's apparent failings on transparency
10:21have also been challenged in Europe.
10:27He's been an MEP for 15 years.
10:30We've calculated he's received about £4 million
10:34in salary and allowances,
10:37but he has never published fully audited accounts
10:40showing how it's been spent.
10:47He has always said he's only taking money from Europe
10:51to further the UKIP cause.
10:54But critics say the party doesn't work for the money.
10:58It has the worst voting record in Parliament.
11:03And Nigel himself is in the bottom six of all MEPs
11:07for turning up to vote.
11:11Parliament is there. They've been elected to it.
11:13They're paid to do a job.
11:15So not turning up to argue your corner,
11:17not turning up to defend your constituents,
11:20not turning up to make a case, I think that's unjustifiable.
11:26We've done the sums.
11:29By the end of this Parliament, more than £70 million
11:32will have gone to Nigel Farage and his party.
11:37That's taxpayers' money.
11:39So what are we getting for that?
11:42Some great YouTube moments, for one thing.
11:46This is what he had to say about the EU president,
11:49Herman Van Rompuy, in 2010.
11:52You have the charisma of a damp rag
11:54and the appearance of a low-grade bank clerk.
11:57And the question that I want to ask...
12:00The question that I want to ask, that we're all going to ask,
12:03is, who are you?
12:05I'd never heard of you.
12:07Nobody in Europe had ever heard of you.
12:12If you had voted UKIP to give the EU mandarins a bit of what for,
12:17Nigel Farage delivered.
12:21But what about their big campaign issues?
12:26Nigel Farage has been outspoken about the damage
12:29he says Europe has done to British fishing, for example.
12:34In the Channel, the UK fleet has 7% of the quad quota.
12:407%, and the rest of it goes to France and Belgium.
12:43You tell me that's a good deal?
12:45I'm sorry, Fisheries Commissioner, it's a rotten deal.
12:48But when it came to representing British fishermen
12:51on the fishing committee, Nigel went AWOL.
12:54What I think is the biggest waste of money
12:57in the European Union of today,
12:59that's the salary we all pay to Mr Farage.
13:02That is the biggest waste of money.
13:05Oh, no, Mr Farage, let's be honest about it.
13:08You are...
13:10You are a member of the Fisheries Committee, for example,
13:13and you're never there! Never!
13:16In 2011, no attendance.
13:19In 2012, no attendance.
13:22During his last stint on the committee,
13:25he attended just three out of 51 meetings
13:28and missed most key votes.
13:30You pay yourself a salary
13:32without doing any labour in your own committee.
13:35That's the reality of the European Union today.
13:38He tabled just one written question
13:41on fishing policy in the last Parliament.
13:45That's the same number he asked
13:48on the feet of imported Cayman crocodiles.
13:55Nigel Farage has always said
13:58he's trying to subvert the EU project.
14:01But on some subjects, he's happy to get involved.
14:06Take this shopping channel moment from 2013.
14:10These things are remarkable. Let me show you.
14:19Seven months earlier, a British e-cigarette manufacturer
14:22gave £25,000 to UKIP.
14:25This video was Nigel's plea
14:28to stop e-cigarettes being banned by the EU.
14:31I want to see the British government stand up and say
14:34we, under no circumstances, will accept this.
14:43It's now the end of June
14:45and the party is launching
14:47a new Eurosceptic political group in Brussels.
14:53I want to go along.
14:56Bloomberg, Robert Stearns.
14:59Robert Stearns.
15:02But the press officer is only allowing in
15:05a hand-picked list of journalists.
15:14One of the other journalists says that's against the rules.
15:31There are rules that have to be respected.
15:33What rules?
15:34You sat very badly.
15:35Look at the rules for the press conference.
15:37Tell me what rules.
15:38It's not a press conference, it's a private meeting.
15:40OK, you can call it as you want.
15:42We don't accept this.
15:43I don't care what you accept or you don't accept.
15:45I don't care what you accept, what you call it.
15:47You cannot select journalists for a press conference.
15:50It's very clear.
15:51It's not a press conference.
15:52It's after a private meeting.
15:54Is it democracy?
15:55It's not democracy now.
15:56And 12 journalists have been invited.
15:58OK?
15:59But the other journalists refuse to enter
16:02and suddenly, Ukip relents.
16:05I remember the questions you asked in the commission
16:08and you're one of the very few journalists
16:10who ask hard questions.
16:12Because I appreciate that, I will accept your demands.
16:16Everybody?
16:17Everybody.
16:18OK.
16:19That's a good deal.
16:22A small victory for the free press.
16:25Nigel's here to introduce his new allies
16:28in the group Ukip have formed.
16:31Getting this group together has not been the easiest thing.
16:36We've managed it and we are very much united
16:40as a pretty clear, Eurosceptic voice.
16:48Ukip sometimes walks a fine line
16:52between protest and rudeness.
17:00It's July and its new MEPs demonstrate their contempt
17:04for the EU by turning their backs on the anthem
17:07at the opening of Parliament in Strasbourg.
17:17Ukip sits with its new group colleagues
17:21As head of the group, Nigel Farage has a front row seat
17:24and extra speaking rights.
17:27But being in a political group also gives Ukip
17:30extra resources and cash.
17:33To get all that, Nigel has chosen some questionable allies.
17:43One member is Lithuania's Order and Justice Party.
17:51This is one of their MPs protesting a gay pride event last year.
17:56He's wearing a chemical suit and spraying disinfectant
17:59with a sign that says stop AIDS.
18:06Another controversial member of Ukip's political group
18:09is the Sweden Democrats.
18:12Europe belongs to us.
18:19This is one of its campaign videos.
18:22It's a right-wing party with fascist origins.
18:31Nigel Farage has said he's satisfied the two Sweden Democrats
18:35in his group have distanced themselves
18:38from their party's far-right past.
18:42But he won't talk to me about it.
18:45I've just been told by their press officer
18:47that he won't give me an interview
18:49and the party's MEPs won't either.
18:54I won't believe it until I hear it from the man himself.
18:59Mr Farage, Dara McIntyre, BBC Panorama.
19:01Hi.
19:02Mr Farage, why won't you do a formal interview with us,
19:05a formal sit-down interview with BBC Panorama?
19:07What's the upside?
19:09Well, it's a straightforward request.
19:11You're a political party.
19:12Have I said no?
19:13We've been told by your press office.
19:15Have I said no?
19:16They have told us you have said no.
19:18Well, I said I'll think about it.
19:20Will you do this interview with us?
19:22I expect so, but not today because it's kind of quite busy.
19:25That's fine.
19:26Can you tell me, though, one other thing?
19:28Why have your MEPs and party members
19:30been told not to co-operate with us?
19:32Because we understand that you've been sort of
19:35fishing around the dregs of our rejects,
19:40many of whom we don't regard to be particularly reliable witnesses.
19:43We've been carrying out a normal, you know,
19:46investigative, journalistic process, as you would expect.
19:49Yeah, well...
19:50I mean, you would expect to be subject
19:52to the same degree of scrutiny as other political parties.
19:55Yes, of the current political party, I would accept that.
19:58Not so much of the old one, though.
20:00We've had a lot of growing-up problems,
20:02which is perhaps not desperately surprising.
20:04But we've been let down by a lot of people,
20:06and they've gone, and they're past, and they're history.
20:09And we're moving on with a fresh team of people.
20:11And we want to be, you know, a disciplined crew.
20:14So the answer is I will do it, but not, as I say, today.
20:18And will you allow us to speak to your MEPs and your party members?
20:23Will you allow them to co-operate with us?
20:25Well, I can't stop them speaking to you, can I?
20:27We've been told that they've been instructed not to speak to us.
20:30Are you aware of that?
20:31I'm not aware of that, to be honest.
20:33Well, do you disagree with that?
20:35I haven't instructed anyone not to speak to you, or to speak to you.
20:38Well, we've been told that your party has a party which, you know,
20:42you speak about accountability and transparency.
20:44Yes.
20:45Even though your party has instructed its MEPs and members...
20:47What we've learned...
20:48Bear with me a second.
20:49..not to speak to us, not to co-operate with us.
20:51What we've learned from the media is some people give us a fair crack
20:54on the whip, and you get two sides of an argument, and some media don't.
20:57So there are certainly some forms of media
20:59that we would advise people very strongly not to speak to
21:02and not to co-operate with.
21:03You know, when you bang your head against the wall, it hurts.
21:06So, you know, maybe after two or three times of doing it,
21:08you can stop doing it.
21:10You do accept, though, that you're entitled to be scrutinised?
21:12I do accept that, of course I do.
21:14It doesn't mean we have to co-operate with everybody, does it?
21:16No, but, I mean, this is, you know, Panorama.
21:18It's a current affairs programme, you know, that we've told...
21:21I've just said to you I'll co-operate with you, haven't I?
21:29So, Nigel Farage says that he will give me an interview.
21:33But he's unhappy that we've been talking to former UKIP members,
21:37what he calls the dregs of rejects.
21:42A surprising number of them
21:44have fallen out personally with Nigel Farage.
21:50People like Marta Andreasen, a top EU accountant.
21:55I think that the appointment of Marta Andreasen
21:58as the treasurer of this party will leave nobody in any doubt
22:02that our finances are sound.
22:05She later defected to the Tories, accusing Nigel of bullying.
22:10Nigel responded by trashing her publicly,
22:13saying the woman is impossible.
22:19Another of Nigel's rejects is David Campbell-Bannerman,
22:23who used to be his second-in-command.
22:27We've been very lucky, very lucky indeed,
22:30to have my deputy, David Campbell-Bannerman.
22:34But he took the blame for the party's widely criticised 2010 manifesto.
22:40I didn't read it. It was drivel.
22:42I'm pleased to say that the idiot that wrote it
22:44has now left us and joined the Conservatives.
22:51It's a recurring pattern.
22:53We've spoken to 25 former senior party members
22:57who told us they left or were forced out of UKIP
23:00after falling out with Nigel Farage.
23:05He's socially very skilled, very adept at that level.
23:10But behind your back, he'll be stabbing you.
23:13I mean, Brutus has got nothing on Farage.
23:16Look through the history of the party.
23:18Everybody who's actually tried to grab UKIP by the horns
23:24and get the party more professionalised
23:26ends up confronting Farage and ends up leaving.
23:32Despite his earlier promise...
23:34I've just said to you I'll co-operate with you.
23:36..Nigel Farage is now refusing to give me an interview
23:40or to answer any of my written questions.
23:43Instead, he published a statement online
23:46accusing us of planning a new establishment attack against UKIP.
23:51He said our questions showed we were adopting a specific agenda
23:55rather than being fair and balanced.
23:59A programme explaining the workings of the EU
24:02would be far more beneficial than a tedious BBC hatchet job.
24:08He says he's dealt with the points we raised in the past.
24:17It's a surprising response.
24:19He's not usually that camera shy.
24:23Nigel Farage portrays himself as a party leader unlike any other.
24:30He certainly loves to wrong-foot his opponents.
24:35First, there was this.
24:38I'm today leaving the Conservative Party and joining UKIP.
24:41The defection of MP Douglas Carswell in August
24:44took the entire political establishment by surprise.
24:48It's nice to have a leader with whom I agree.
24:51It's early days, though, isn't it?
24:58Then, at the party conference, more UKIP magic.
25:03Nigel pulled another Tory rebel out of his hat.
25:07Nigel Farage has made good on one promise.
25:10He has shaken the political elite.
25:13But the question is, can UKIP,
25:15currently the mischief-makers of British politics,
25:18win any real power at Westminster?
25:23And if so, how?
25:26And if so, how?
25:29And if so, how?
25:32And if so, how?
25:35At the Clacton by-election, the answer was a resounding yes.
25:40Douglas Carswell is duly elected as a Member of Parliament
25:43for the said constituency. Thank you.
25:50Douglas Carswell became the party's first elected MP.
25:56It's a huge coup for Nigel Farage
25:58and a sign of the public's disillusionment
26:00with traditional politicians.
26:02We have a career political class of college kids
26:04who've never had jobs in their lives,
26:06who have absolutely no connection with what we peacefully want
26:09and how they're struggling.
26:10We need new people. We need change. Real change.
26:14We don't know yet whether this new political romance will last.
26:19Whoa, whoa, whoa.
26:20When's the last time you played rugby?
26:24It's like being second row, isn't it?
26:27But critics and supporters agree on one thing.
26:30UKIP is still all about Nigel Farage.
26:34He really is a very skilled operator.
26:38But he will be 100% looking after Farage's career
26:44and Farage's leadership.
26:46He's not there for the party.
26:48This is Farage's party. This is Farage's ego trip.
26:54He may have a talent for falling out with his colleagues,
26:57but a growing number of voters are trusting in Nigel Farage.
27:01He's just a normal fella, really,
27:03just trying to talk a bit of common sense
27:05and being taken the wrong way.
27:07But at the end of the day,
27:09he's only trying to do what's best for people in Great Britain,
27:13where his home is, yeah?
27:18Nigel Farage, the career politician
27:21who says he's not like other politicians,
27:24has succeeded in selling his image to the British public.
27:31If voters continue believing in plain-speaking Nigel,
27:35then his People's Army really could be storming Westminster
27:39at the general election.
27:42Are you ready to join UKIP's People's Army?
27:49Next week, as Allied troops prepare for the general election,
27:52Next week, as Allied troops prepare to leave Afghanistan,
27:55Panorama goes inside a Taliban stronghold
27:58where their control is absolute
28:00and where guns take the place of toys.
28:07Coming up, the UN warns that the Ebola crisis
28:10is the worst health emergency in modern times.
28:13From tomorrow, some passengers arriving at Heathrow from West Africa
28:16will be screened. We'll have the details.
28:20Next, though, who'd kill an amateur sleuth?
28:23Another intriguing case for the New Tricks team.