UKIP struggles to get anything right

An irate constituent has passed on to me a leaflet she has received from the so-called UK Independence Party which, she says, contains a dozen lies on the front page alone. She points out that it says:

• That the European Union "has its own army". Oh yes? Could you please name a single general, colonel or major in that army?

• That the EU has its own police force. Eh? Europol, like Interpol, helps national police forces to co-ordinate, but is not a separate police force, as UKIP well knows.

• That the EU "is trying to seize even more powers in order to create a centralised European super-state". But the EU only has powers that are conferred on it by unanimous agreement of all the member states. That is why the "centralised superstate" is myth, as illustrated by the facts that the entire EU budget is less than 1% of GDP and the European Commission has fewer employees than Leeds City Council. Some superstate!

• That "when the UK government first signed us up to the fledgling EU back in the 1970s they assured us it was all about free trade and free travel". No they didn't. The government white paper back then was very clear that it was about more than free trade (We were actually leaving a free trade area (EFTA) in order to join!) and was an important political project.

• It says "they told us nothing about all the extra political powers which Brussels was set to grab from Westminster", quoting as examples the EU’s legal system, judiciary and legislature. Yet these all pre-existed our accession to the EU and are, actually, welcome parts of it, implying as they do the rule of law (rather than the rule of the most powerful), and democracy (an elected parliament).

• They say that "Britain should be ruled by our parliament in Westminster not by an undemocratic bureaucracy in Brussels". But Britain is indeed run by a parliament (one chamber of which is elected) in Westminster, albeit one dominated by the executive. And the EU is run by an elected parliament and the Council of Ministers (composed of the elected governments of each country), not by its bureaucracy (which is anyway quite small compared to Whitehall).

The leaflet also goes on to crow about the 12 seats UKIP gained in the 2004 European elections (as many as the Liberal Democrats), but remains totally silent on what happened to these 12 members: one going to jail for benefit fraud (Ashley Mote), one leaving UKIP to found another party, which he then also left (Kilroy Silk), one being suspended pending a police inquiry into misuse of parliamentary expenses (Tom Wise) etc. etc. Wonder why?