By Tony Peters
Hard on the heels of its catastrophic annual conference last weekend, UKIP has suffered another high-level resignation. And, as Searchlight predicted back in July, it’s Paul Campbell (above), the party’s Wales Regional Officer who is the latest to decide enough is enough.
Campbell’s resignation – both as Regional Officer and as a UKIP member – has not been made public yet, but he communicated it to the UKIP leadership on their confidential ‘Smoked Herring’ WhatsApp group on Monday. Campbell says he is, “disappointed at recent events in particular the leadership election fiasco. I was supporting Bill Etheridge and expected him to win easily”.
In this, Campbell was not alone. Virtually the entire membership expected UKIP veteran Etheridge, a former MEP, to be elected leader in May, and were astonished when newly-recruited Lois Perry swept the board with almost 80% of the vote. Actual voting numbers have never been published by UKIP Chairman Ben ‘Rogue Builder’ Walker, the party’s Returning Officer.
Perry lasted only a few weeks, before dramatically resigning during the general election campaign, to be replaced by another recent recruit, Deputy Leader, Nick Tenconi. Tenconi is now Leader having been elected to neither position but simply put in post by the now omnipotent Walker. The timing of Campbell’s decision, however, suggests that events around the conference, albeit added to other concerns such as last May’s leadership election, triggered his departure.
Tenconi’s new direction for UKIP as a party of the Christian far right has also made Campbell unhappy; while he acknowledges that Tenconi is a dynamic leader, he says he “cannot get totally on board with the heavy Religious dialogue”.
Campbell, who doubles up as an unlikely Elvis Presley impersonator, suggests that the Wales party organisation should be taken over by Stan Robinson (above right), the Llanelli gobshite and former trade union buster. With the convicted fraudster Dan Morgan (above left), he runs the Voice of Wales online operation which is long on abusive talk, but rather short on ability or action.
Recent months have seen the resignations of Deputy Leader Rebecca Jane, Party Director Pat Mountain and her successor, Lester ‘Jeff’ Taylor, Bill Etheridge, Health and Social Care Spokesperson Dr Chris Ho, Defence and Veterans Spokesperson former Squadron Leader Peter Richardsson, Home Affairs Spokesperson Steve Unwin, and Education Spokesperson Julie Carter. The National Executive Committee has also been denuded by departures and is now thought to be so small that it cannot even muster the required quorum to meet.