Nigel Farage lights up Conservative conference fringe
Wednesday, October 2, 2013 at 8:45 Without question Nigel Farage was the star of the Conservative conference fringe on Monday.
Invited to speak at meetings organised by The Freedom Association, the Bruges Group and Forest, the UKIP leader was followed everywhere by a pack of journalists and photographers hungry for a good news story.
They got it at Manchester Town Hall where Farage clashed with eurosceptic Conservative MP Bill Cash in front of 300 people.
After that the circus moved on to the Bridgewater Hall where a Freedom Association event in the Barbirolli Room attracted another full house (150 people).
Finally it was on to The Comedy Store for the Forest/IEA event, A Beer and a Fag with Farage.
I can't tell you the exact number of people who were there. According to the BBC the "the small basement auditorium [was] just over half full".
In fact, the Comedy Store auditorium is larger than it looks. It has 380 seats (with another 150 on the balcony) so I reckon we had about 200 people – not bad for Nigel's third meeting of the day.
If he was tired – and he had every right to be – he did a good job of disguising the fact.
Interviewed by the IEA's Mark Littlewood, he responded well to a series of searching questions including, "Did you ever take illegal drugs as a young man?"
Unusually for a modern politician, Farage insisted his only vices had been smoking and drinking.
Sadly there wasn't time to invite him to try an e-cigarette or snus.
Instead, after yet another pint and a fag, he was gone. He had lit up (no pun intended) the Conservative conference fringe and it was time to go home.
Postscript: Boris Johnson was the star of another not-so-fringe meeting at exactly the same time that Nigel Farage was appearing at The Comedy Store.
The BBC sent reporters to both events - see Tory conference: Boris Johnson v Nigel Farage.
The Forest/IEA meeting was also filmed by a TV crew making a documentary about Farage for Channel 4.
A brief clip of Mark Littlewood on stage with Farage was featured at the start of the Daily Politics, and I understand the meeting was mentioned on both the Today programme and PM (Radio 4).
A Beer and a Fag with Farage also featured in the Huffington Post's Pictures of the Day feature.
A Reuters picture from the event was also included in a similar feature in the Guardian. See The Best Pictures of the Day and scroll down.
Reader Comments (4)
Farage can run rings around the Tories and it was reported that several Topry MP's walked out half way through his speech clearly very worried about the UKIP threat
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Nigel Farage's enjoyment of a pint of beer and a smoke are reaching parts of the electorate that the other parties do not reach (apologies Heineken). They are our uniquely individual qualities which are about choice and freedom from manipulative. social engineering. Every success to him.
He does come across as terribly...normal. Unlike the other lot, who seem to be constantly striving to appear to be unimpeachable paragons of virtue, in the mistaken belief that that is what people want.
When you see pictures of Farage having a pint, he actually looks like he's really enjoying that beer for what it is, and to hell with the tittle-tattle of the tabloids. When Cameron is pictured with a pint, he looks like the glass is merely a prop for a photo-op to show him as an 'ordinary bloke'. Which he's not. He's a twat like the rest of them. And you just know that as soon as the photo-op is over, he'll put down the half full glass and ask for a Chardonnay. Not that I've got any problems with Chardonnay - I'm a wine man myself (albeit a red wine drinker), but Cameron is fooling no-one with his attempts at the common touch.
I agree with the above but doesent it say a lot when we congratulate a member of govt, or any person for that matter, for enjoying a pint and a fag in public as if it were an alien act!
It just shows how restricted our quality of life has become now that we're foreced to comply under EU (the New Soviet Union) directives.
The race to the bottom is sure under way.
Well done Nigel Farage I hope UKIP puts manners on the other weenies at the next election.