Farage might be UKIP’s candidate but only Labour has the answers in South Thanet

Now that Nigel Farage has announced he is throwing his hat in the ring, South Thanet is a two horse race: Labour and UKIP. The Tories have selected a former UKIP Leader meaning there is now no difference between the Tories and UKIP. With this, the Tories have abandoned the centre ground and gambled everything on trying to out-UKIP UKIP.

It is clear now for people in Broadstairs, Cliftonville, Ramsgate and Sandwich that the only way to stop the two UKIP candidates is to vote Labour. A vote for any other candidate will let UKIP in and give them a platform to put forward their right wing views. It would be hard to find more compelling evidence for this argument concerning UKIP’s views and behaviour than the recent racist comment by Janice Atkinson MEP in Ramsgate where she referred to a local Thai resident as a ‘ting tong from somewhere’. This has shown the ugly side of UKIP. Sadly this is not even the first time that she has insulted local people. Janice referred to Cliftonville back in May as a no-go area, thereby denigrating all the people working so hard to improve the area. I still meet residents on the door step that are furious about this.

Every Party has people that act badly but it is the way that they are dealt with that is important. UKIP had a chance to show that they take racism very seriously, but instead Janice has just received a slap on the wrist. To make matters worse, Janice has responded to the member of public complaining about her racist behavior by saying ‘let them have their 5 minutes of fame’. It is appalling that a UKIP MEP feels she has the right to demean Cliftonville, racially insult a resident and then only get a mild talking to from her leader for her efforts. There has been no investigation or disciplinary action taken by UKIP, which is simply wrong.

Here in South Thanet the Labour Party is the only political party running a positive campaign that is working at grassroots level. We are running a strong local campaign, distributing thousands of leaflets and knocking on hundreds of doors every month. We also have regular street stalls and our office is open every day. In the last 12 months we have had nearly 200 local activists volunteer and this is growing every single day.

Labour are also the only Party that actually has a plan to tackle some of the problems in South Thanet. Youth unemployment is higher than the regional average and so we have made this the focus of a local campaign highlighting the importance of the Labour Jobs Guarantee. We also have serious problems with our local hospital, with the Care Quality Commission writing a damning report about lack of staffing at the A&E department staffing and a reliance on locum staff and overtime. Other problems in the area include huge problems with the private sector housing market, low wages and lots of people feeling the squeeze of the cost of living crisis. Labour’s announcements on private sector housing, the NHS, living standards and the jobs guarantee will go a long way to dealing with these problems. While Labour are tackling these issues, the two UKIP candidates are preoccupied with trying to ‘be more UKIP’ than the other and so are missing the real problems.

I am looking forward to working with local people and colleagues from across the Labour movement to make sure that we win South Thanet back for Labour in 2015. I am confident that we have the team to do it, but we are always grateful for more support. If you would like to help us then please get in contact. My email address is [email protected] and my office number is 01843 584010.

Will Scobie is Labour’s Parliamentary Candidate for South Thanet.