Marta Andreasen, Nigel's self inflicted problem

Suddenly on the democracy forum people are realising the problems with La Andreasen. She does not seem to live or appear in the UK. It is not clear whether she pays UK, EU or Spanish taxes. I quote a recent posting from Aardvark, a moderator on Democracy Forum that sums up peoples concerns.

"Where is Marta living at present? Has anybody seen her at her London address recently? Where does her husband live? Has he ever declared an address in London as his residence? If not, is Marta divorced or separated? It is a strange relationship where a husband believes himself to be resident in Spain and his wife believes herself to be resident in the UK (all the overseas contractors I know are either colocated overseas with their spouses or are resident in the UK for tax purposes). UKIP, British jobs for British workers, has an ethnic Danish MEP born in Argentina and currently holding Spanish citizenship employing a Dutch researcher in Brussels who doesn't yet visit the UK on her behalf. As her constituent I do not feel she properly represents my interests having no real connection with my constituency (London isn't in the SE region for electoral purposes) or my country.

UKIP could easily have had a British MEP using Marta as his/her researcher in Brussels. He/she would have asked the same questions and made the same points in committee (it's not like the HoC where you can debate and therefore have to think on your feet). The difference being that those of us in the South East Region could have been represented by someone who lives here and knows some of the area.

I think UKIP have made a mistake and will regret their choice at a later stage."

Moderators are usually quite careful not to give their personal views on contentious issues to preserve their impartiality so this is strong stuff.

There were always questions about her previous employment record. A poster describing himself as ex-member writes:

"I am particularly glad to see the forum moderators taking the Andreasen scandal on board. I am afraid that Farage and Pearson have fallen for the simperer. I do not think Pearson was even aware that Andreasen was suspended from OECD till recently and would not be surprised if she concealed the suspension from Farage.
Perhaps the two gentlemen might be asked whether they were aware of this suspension,whether they have investigated it and would they answer the disquiet about it?"

I was on the NEC when concerns about Andreasen were raised particularly by Lynnda Robson, Gerard Batten's political assistant who herself hoped to be an MEP candidate for the London region. I cannnot improve on the email she sent to the NEC asking for Andreasen to be disqualified from standing. I quote from her summary,

"To paraphrase George Orwell: 'Why are some candidates more equal than others?' I am absolutely sure that if when I had applied I had said :

I'm not a UK resident;
I'm not a fully paid-up member of UKIP;
I can't get a CRB check;
My proposer has also proposed someone else;
I'm not on the UK electoral Register; and
I have no intention of mentioning I will be standing in two Regions

I believe I would have been very firmly rejected - and rightly so."



Lynnda points out that 5 or 6 of UKIP's own selection rules that every other candidate had to conform to were waived for Andreasen. This was done by Gill, an ex Tory MP who was responsible for seeing the rules were observed! This was clearly at Farage's behest and Gill lamely claimed that "he was trying to be helpful"! I asked helpful to whom to which I received no reply.

More damaging politically is that Andreasen is on record as wishing to reform the EU from within, the failed policy of every UK government since Heath and directly contradictory to UKIP's core 'leave the EU policy'

The problems now emerging with Andreasen, and there will be more to come, could have been avoided if the UKIP selection rules had been applied fairly but Nigel seems to think rules are for other people like Robin Page and not his Cabal.

Now there is nothing that Nigel or anyone else can do about this woman. She has her bum on a UK MEP seat for the next 5 years and cannnot be removed. Nigel has made his bed and he will have to lie in it. The sad thing is that all the decent, ordinary UKIP members have coughed up their 10 or 20 pounds to help get Andreasen into this very cushy job will have to lie in that same bed! I doubt they realised that when they voted for Nigel.

The worst thing of all is the damage she will do our withdrawal cause. She will be a god send to the Europhiles at the next UK General Election about which Marta knows little and cares less. She has what she wants.