On the south coast of England in September 2011 a group of like-minded people came together from all over the country. These people were as diverse as you could get BUT still had the same vision of putting the GREAT back into Britain.

It was of course the UKIP National Conference in Eastbourne – there was a mutual feeling among everyone we spoke to that UKIP’s time has arrived, and we are firmly one of the players when it comes to British politics.

People had attended the conference from far and wide, all four corners of the UK – The North East showed its support with Mr. Steve Allison (party vice-chairman) introducing the speakers on the Saturday morning and Newcastle upon Tyne’s very own John Tennant spoke about working in the European parliament.
As a member of the newly formed Middlesbrough branch I was delighted to be able to attend what I could only describe as a sensational conference, there was a buzz of excitement in the air. British politics is no longer a three horse race as UKIP have arrived standing tall and ready to take all challengers. UKIP is a common sense party not a single-issue party, we are the party of the people this was very apparent at the conference. We are one of the most diverse parties and the most relevant party and because of this, I am delighted and honored to be a member. What I got from the conference was maybe different to what some others took away, but I must say I feel we all took away the positivity and energy.

Steve Crowther the Executive Party Chairman kept things in order on the Friday morning introducing some excellent speakers this included – Cllr Lisa Duffy (Mayor of Ramsey) who took the floor, and her genuine likeability showed through and her uplifting speech about how she and her team on the town council in Ramsey had proven UKIP councilors are worth voting for and are taken seriously.
Whatever your class or ethnic background, it doesn’t matter. UKIP’s politics will cater for you, recently the national media has started to realise this with Alex Singleton and Patrick O’Flynn giving outstanding speaches, Former Daily Telegraph journalist Alex Singleton and now member of UKIP said, “there are two types of people I think who talk about international development – fantasists and realists ” he went on to mention that the fantasists just think writing cheque after cheque to poor countries will magically make all their problems disappear, The realists know this is naive and can see the difference that countries such as our own can make, he went on to say that the wallets of everyday people were being taken, and our hard-earned cash was being squandered.

A fifth of the foreign aid budget went to the EU, whom spent some of the money on a fashion show. Yes I repeat a fashion show this was highlighted in Alex’s speech among other things such as why we shouldn’t allow our government to be dictated to by the EU over EU bailouts. Patrick O’Flynn of the Express talked about how the Express had noticed that UKIP as a party should not be dismissed, sadly they keep mentioning that our party is growing in strength, mainly from Tories, who feel let down by Cameron – when it fact that isn’t entirely true we have lots of ex-Labour Party members – the chairman of the Middlesbrough branch of UKIP was once a Labour Party member. Nigel Farage said “Working class people have been betrayed by Labour on immigration and the view that they’re not worth employing. Fancy saying that about your own population. These are decent people who want to work and want to obey the law. UKIP stands for those people.”
Other great speakers at the conference included Neil Hamilton the former Tory minister and member of their party for around 30 years who revealed why he joined UKIP, declaring “I’m out, and I’m proud!” his “all fur coats and no knickers” reference to the Tory party got a huge laugh but on a serious note he told the conference how he joined the Anti Common Market League way back in 1967 (when Nigel Farage was a mere 4 years old). 1971 came around, and Neil was invited to speak at the Conservative conference on the same panel was Enoch Powell, the debate of the day was ‘should we go into Europe’. Neil brought to the attention of the Eastbourne audience just how much of our money is being spent on EU embassies a colossal £80 billion pounds and in fact, this is just duplicating embassies that the 27 EU state members already have. He told us how bailouts under the Lisbon treaty are, in fact, illegal under article 125.

You could ask yourself how could such an informative and humorous speech be followed – easy when you have speakers from the Netherlands and Finland and France letting us all know we are not alone in our fight to free ourselves from the shackles of the EU. These next three speakers all took to the floor and showed that to be a united Europe we don’t need to be members of EU. The Freedom Association held a couple of fringe events, and they stated that they only attend ‘mainstream political party conferences.’ Demonstrating that UKIP has come of age!

Saturday was upon us, and the conference was in full swing – the YI (young independants) gave several speeches. The speakers included Harry Aldridge, Tom Booker, Steve Fowler and Sean Howlett. All of these speakers were of a high caliber and spoke with great passion for a party they truly believe in.

My personal highlight of Saturday was listening to the fantastic Bill Etheridge his humorous opening led into a very serious talk on the absurdity of Political Correctness. Bill told us the following “In 1994 a pub in Kent decided it was to advertise plough-person lunches. Hackney council doesn’t have man hole covers they have personal access chambers. In 1999, Telford council replaced father Christmas with mother Christmas.” We can all laugh along with this never-ending list, but it is actually very serious as Bill went on to explain – Bill himself was a victim of the PC brigade and so is an advocate of the Campaign against Political Correctness. I was also delighted to have lunch with Bill and his wife Star, who are two of the nicest people you could ever meet, and who spend so much of their own time to fight the cause and bring back common sense as Star said, “no one has ever died from being offended and never will ” Never a truer statement!

Anti-HS2 campaigner Joe Rukin addressed the conference on the high speed rail issue that is proving to be a divisive issue in parts of the country.

Ben Pile from the Fight the Turbines Campaign, was well received by the conference crowd in Eastbourne.
Inez Ward an ex landlady was speaking on behalf of Justice for Licensees and the decline of the British pub which is the third highest grossing tourist industry in the UK. UKIP are in favour of supporting our pubs as well as many other major issues that affect our country.

The wind of change is blowing through this country of ours and UKIP will be seen as a great alternative to the other three major parties. UKIP are here to stay and even when we eventually win our battle of getting out of the EU, The people of Great Britain and Northern Ireland will see that we do have other polices that are relevant and that we are not a party to be pushed to one side or laughed at and as many have tried to do. And to think Cameron called us ‘a bunch of fruit cakes!’. British democracy which has existed for around two thousand years is slowly and inexorably being eroded by the EU – It is vital we remove ourselves from its insidious clutches then we can once again put the GREAT back in Britain. UKIP is here to stay and is a force to be reckoned with.
Michael Johnson
UKIP Middlesbrough