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news
Jacob Rees-Mogg and Penny farthing (original photo licensed CC BY-SA 2.0 on Flickr by Bob Walker).jpgBrexit Party hopeful candidate begs Nigel Farage for penny-farthing spokesman job
A penny-farthing rider from Battersea who hopes to be a candidate for the Brexit Party has begged its leader, Nigel Farage, to be given a job as the party’s spokesman to represent the views of fellow enthusiasts – as well as cyclists and motorbikers more generally.
65-year-old Alan Price – a past Conservative voter who describes his political views as “slightly to the right of Genghis Khan” – arrived at a press conference for the party on his penny-farthing, reports The New European.
Farage founded the party earlier this month after the continued postponement of the date the UK is due to leave the EU meant that the country will go to the polls next month for the European parliamentary elections.
Candidates confirmed as standing for the party include Annunziata Rees-Mogg, the sister of the Conservative MP and leader of the Tory backbencher pro-Brexit European Research Group, Jacob Rees-Mogg (pictured above).
Price, evidently, has done his own research – although perhaps surprisingly, it doesn’t stand up to close scrutiny.
He claimed that the EU had “harassed and excessively regulated” the “35 million” people in the UK who choose to get around on two wheels.
Analysis of government statistics by Cycling UK suggests that figure may be a slight exaggeration. In 2017, 6.1 million people in Great Britain cycled once a week or more, a further 3.1 million at least once a month, and 5.3 million less than once a month.
That gives a grand total of 14.5 million – equivalent to 28 per cent of the population – and it’s highly unlikely most would consider themselves “cyclists.” Meanwhile, more than two thirds of the population never cycle.
As for motorcycles, only 2 per cent of households nationally have access to one.
Besides that slight quibble over statistics, Price claims to speak for everyone who gets around on two wheels, powered or otherwise. “We as a group are massively in support of Brexit,” he trumpeted.
Hoping to be approved as a candidate for the Brexit Party in the forthcoming elections, he said: “Democracy has failed to work because we voted out and we want out.
“I have a personal interest in excessive taxation and bicycle tyres but there are also plenty of other laws about kettles and everything else.”
Including bendy bananas, at a guess.
“I'm excited now that democracy may rule in the UK because it clearly has not been ruling in recent times,” he added.
Touching as his plea to represent cyclists and motorbikers – and, yes, penny-farthing riders – is, he may wish to check the cycling policies of UKIP, the party Farage previously led.
In its manifesto for the 2010 general election, the party claimed that it “supports pedal cycles as a healthy means of personal transport.”
But while it said that “there needs to be a better balance of rights and responsibilities for pedal cyclists,” the focus was very much on the latter – it insisted there was “too much aggressive abuse of red lights, pedestrian crossings and a lack of basic safety and road courtesy.”
One solution it suggested was for cyclists to be required to have third party insurance combined with compulsory bike licensing in the form of a “Cycledisc.”
It also said it supported “provision of cycle parking at reasonable charges,” as well as compulsory training for cyclists, and for riders to be forced to dismount at “busy roundabouts, junctions or bus lanes, or where the road would be too narrowed by cycle lanes and cause unacceptable delays to traffic.”
Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.
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70 comments
Kettles - the ones that last barely a year and then have to be replaced with the old one going to landfill.
A vote winner.
I'd have thought cyclists tend to be educated middle earners who, as a larger group were in favour of staying.
not in my name, bud, that’s for sure.
i liked the meat eating argument further up - change the script to “shall we all turn Uber right-wing tonight?”
people here and in the US voted to kick against authority in 2016.
In a video interview doing the rounds on various local news web sites, he quotes a suspiciously-round figure of 80% of 35 million cyclists as having voted leave. Quite why cyclists would've been more likely than the general population to do so, he doesn't say. He probably gets his statistics from Facebook posts, the ultimate source of information for people who think Wikipedia is a mouthpiece of the establishment.
But in a world in which Old Etonians can get away with claiming to represent the masses against the elites, and a person who bragged about not paying tax became President by promising to drain the swamp, surely a penny-farthing-riding nutjob can say he speaks for all cyclists, including the extra imaginary ones who ride around the inside of his head, wall-of-death-style.
I bet that comes from the claim -- frequently repeated by Theresa May -- that around 80% of the electorate who voted in the last general election voted for the Conservatives or Labour, who both had manifestos at the time saying that they would enact Brexit. She has claimed that this means that 80% of the population supports Brexit, and particularly her Brexit, although of course this does not follow from the measure she is using...
Why is it that the people we hear most often going on about democracy are the ones "slightly to the right of Genghis Khan" who want to kick out the fuzzy wuzzies, who were lied to by their leaders, and who still think people like Farage or Rees-Mogg are "men of the people". God! It makes me so sick. What went wrong with this country...? I want a time machine (and possibly a hunting rifle)...
Alan Price does not represent my views. This either means I never cycle, or he is an idiot.
I'm fairly sure I cycle.
I'm not a fan of his music either...
“Democracy has failed to work because we voted out and we want out."
Meanwhile there are many quite intelligent Brexit voters who have changed their minds since the bullshit and lies have become public knowledge. Only the deranged are banging on about this, and leave means leave. It's a shame that these fools get so much publicity that gives them some sort of legitimacy.
This is not a harmless eccentric.
I am sorry that you object to the platform that this site has given to this idiot's views, roadmanshaq, but for me, I am glad I know them so that I may vehemently oppose everything he says, does and is.
And just looking at the numbers, if there are 35 million of us, and the often quoted vote was 17.4 million, that's not even half.
It's just so hard not have a stereotype of Leave campaign supporters when people like Alan Price put themselves forward as representatives.
As far as purporting to represent cyclists, he has about as much relevance as something my cat hacked up earlier.
Is this a joke? Come to road.cc for cycling, end up with far right political campaign material. What an absolute disgrace. Have a word with yourself editor.
If you are confusing a legitimate report on a cycling-related issue (and one in which it's not too hard to read between the lines) wwith "far right political material," it's probably yourself you should "have a word with."
I am in no way shocked that another old white man sees nothing wrong with giving the desired coverage to a political group which agitates for racial hatred. Maybe for you this is a cheap file-and-go-home-early silly season story. For people like me who are being spat at in the street for speaking french on our phones it isn't so funny.
I'm sorry you're getting grief for speaking french - that is not funny.
I think you're misdirecting your anger towards this article which is clearly not right wing propaganda and instead has an incredulous tone.
If you look at the source quoted for the article (https://www.theneweuropean.co.uk), they're most definitely pro-european. Their shop sells some anti-brexit merchandise
c7aa1f28-555a-4ef3-949c-6805360d2d87.jpg
Mate, if you can't hear the piss-taking in the original article, I can't really help you. However, it's probably a good life choice to decide not to attack people who agree with you...
You're a fool. This article is a PR win for UKIP. It humanises them as relatable people, not the rancid, far right hate-mongering scum that they are.
And the prophecy cometh true, Irrespective of the article or the intention of it, the Brexiteers come out to demonstrate their dumbenss and try and defend the stupidity. Not far from now toys will be thrown and dummies will be spat (not at roadmanshaq, hopefully) as the realisation dawns that there is NO argument to defend Brexit except the thick racist cuntish one of immigration, and we know that that's a load of bollocks. But hey, it gives the right wingers the chancwe to out themselves before they get to crawl back into their boxes.
Choose a door FrankH.
Well I'm glad that cycling is on the political agenda, but I think he's a bit confused about cyclists.
Now, as the comments here are bound to devolve into a political slanging match, I'll present an argument on why the referendum was flawed (apologies for repeating this).
Source: https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/politics/take-it-from-the-swiss-the-brexit-referendum-wasnt-legitimate
Apology not accepted.
I know why I voted Leave, I've been told often enough during the last 34 months.
I'm racist, thick as pig-shit, ill-informed, uninformed, a working class oik having a tantrum, a little Englander pining for the days of Empire, I believed what was written on the side of a bus and I'm racist, did I mention racist?
I'm assuming that's hyperbole. So, why DID you vote Leave?
Genuinely interested.
I believe we have too much government. Voting Leave was an opportunity (or so I thought) to remove one whole layer.
That's one reason. Is that good enough?
(I could mention bananas, we have EU regulations regarding the minimum size of bananas. Think about that. We have people employed by government who have so little to do that we pay them to think up stupid rules about the size of bananas, but when you mention bananas and the EU you get people laughing at you about stupid people believing that the EU have banned bent bananas so I won't mention bananas.)
EU GDP ~$19 trillion, EU budget €165.8 bn, about 1% of the EU GDP. This is not in any way a layer of Big Government.
We have EU regulations regarding how bananas should be graded, like all agricultural goods, so you know that if you buy grade 1 bananas they will be a generally consistent size, shape, and quality. Lower grades are available. This is all in pursuit of allowing businesses to deal with consistent products so that when they buy a box of bananas, for example, they don't find that there's a top layer of perfect fruit and a bunch of manky ones underneath. What is the problem with having reasonable definitions of grades of produce so that everyone in the trade chain knows what they are buying and selling? You cannot, as a banana importer, inspect every single container of fruit that you buy yourself: you have to rely on some standard so that you know what you are buying.
It's this kind of daft idea about how regulations work and are applied that have led to a lot of misconceptions about both the EU and the Health and Safety Executive.
We have EU regulations regarding how bananas should be graded, like all agricultural goods, so you know that if you buy grade 1 bananas they will be a generally consistent size, shape, and quality. Lower grades are available. This is all in pursuit of allowing businesses to deal with consistent products so that when they buy a box of bananas, for example, they don't find that there's a top layer of perfect fruit and a bunch of manky ones underneath. What is the problem with having reasonable definitions of grades of produce so that everyone in the trade chain knows what they are buying and selling? You cannot, as a banana importer, inspect every single container of fruit that you buy yourself: you have to rely on some standard so that you know what you are buying.
It's this kind of daft idea about how regulations work and are applied that have led to a lot of misconceptions about both the EU and the Health and Safety Executive.
[/quote]
But this is leapt upon with glee by the msm, working for their billionaire bosses, and sold to the Great British populace as unelected Brussels bureaucrats riding roughshod over our own wonderful, perfectly just, impeccably correct, laws and standards. As H L Mencken said "No-one ever went bust under estimating the intelligence of the American public." We are no different.
Boris Johnson, of course, was the Telegraph's Brussels correspondent in the early 90s, and was responsible for a reasonable number of the myths circulating now.
Good crikey, you actually mentioned bananas and I'm genuinely not sure if you are having a little wind up. There's just not many people prepared to admit they actually believed that banana stuff about the EU, it's like the classic fake news meme which is why they get laughed at and called stupid.
Just for the record, the reality is that bananas like an awful lot of other agricultural products are graded so that when they go to commercial auction, the purchaser for Tescos can buy a bazillion bananas of a certain grade and know what it is they are getting without having to inspect them all first hand. If there is any imperative for the acceptable bendiness of bananas that appear on our shelves then it is driven by consumer demand and supermarkets. Having a single EU classification system saves individual countries a huge amount of money in avoiding duplicate legislation. Having an EU wide standard enables suppliers to conform to a single set of rules rather than handle the bureaucratic overhead of 27 different sets of paperwork and import standards. Incidentally no bananas of any shape or size are actually banned, they get classified as class 2 and can be as bendy as you like.
Care to do some research on vacuum cleaners before you come back with that false meme?
Quality: fair enough. Care to do some research on bananas? Here, I'll give you somewhere to start:
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CONSLEG:1994R2257...
You'll see that what I said about small bananas is correct.
Did you even read what he wrote? No one denies the existence of quality standards. They are pointing out your lack of understanding of what they are and why they are needed.
And I quite clearly said that quality standards are fair enough. Did you even read what he wrote. Let me quote the relevant bit:
"...no bananas of any shape or size are actually banned..."
Did you even read the link I provided? I guess you didn't:
"The minimum length permitted is 14 cm and the minimum grade permitted is 27 mm." (Grade is their way of saying thickness.)
Ergo, as I said, small bananas are banned.
So, you're happy that these bureaucrats are setting standards of quality, in spite of not wanting an extra level of government. you're just pissed off that they won't let you buy small bananas. Why is that? I assume that as it's just one line in 7 pages of text, one line I must have missed as I read through, so insignificant it must be. Why are you so hung up on not being able to buy small bananas, but happy to accept the (same) rules on quality.
Why is buying small bananas so important to you?
they're readily available in Marks and Spencer's
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