The Foreign Secretary hits out at the Tories for joing forces with racists, anti-Semites and homophobes in the European Parliament
David Miliband feels “sick” at the conduct of the Tories in Europe. Describing the Conservatives as “a bunch of schoolboys,” the Foreign Secretary hit out at David Cameron and his colleagues for ditching Europe’s mainstream centre-Right parties to “sit with a collection of outcasts.”
Speaking at the Labour party conference today he said:
“Last week on the BBC – and you should go through the transcript – Eric Pickles, the chairman of the Conservative party, explained without a hint of shame that we should not condemn one of their new allies, the ‘For Fatherland and Freedom’ party, who every year celebrate the Latvian Waffen SS with a march past of SS veterans, because ‘they were only following orders’.
“It makes me sick.
“And you know what makes me sicker? No one in the Tory party batted an eyelid.
“What do they say? All you need for evil to triumph is for good men to remain silent.
“When Edward McMillan-Scott, one of their own MEPs, a former leader of the Tory group in Europe, took these people on, and won the Vice Presidency of the European Parliament, defeating a man denounced by the Chief Rabbi of Poland for an anti-Semitic, neo-Nazi past, what did the Tories do to MacMillan-Scott? They chucked him out of the Tory party.”
11 Responses to “Miliband on Tory far-Right alliance: “It makes me sick””
Richard Watts
Hard hitting stuff from @DMiliband at #Lab09. Are the Tories really comfortable with their new friends: http://bit.ly/ZFmbu ?
Swagata
If we look at the evidence from Latvia, it appears many people commemorate the “Latvian Legion” as some sort of bulwark against Soviet oppression. See http://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSTRE52F3UB20090316 for more. I don’t think the commemorations are anti-semitic, they are just anti-Soviet/pro Latvian. Although if someone wants to post details of more sinister acts, please do.
Similar things happened in several European countries, unlike Britain they had to choose between brutal fascism and totalitarian socialism. British should think twice before pointing the finger at others. It wasn’t long ago Britain unveiled a statue to Bomber Harris, architect of “carpet bombing”, in London. A quick visit to Wikipedia reveals a single night’s raid by the RAF on Dresden alone claimed the lives of “several tens of thousands of civilians”.
I’d hope someone like Milliband – he’s well-educated – would understand the subtleties of European history instead of trying to score cheap points.
Caroline Sick Of The Lies
Personally I am disgusted that a Foreign Secretary of this country feels it proper to comment on other nations in the way he did. But it’s the culture of these people, people who have never done a days work in their lives.
I watched Brown last night acting as the thuggish unelected bully we know he is towards Adam Boulton. The wide eyed space case’s behaviour is another example of the desperate tactics this fag end government will resort to.
Just like McBride and his ilk – lie and run people down even though a poor man has lost his disabled son.
Draper, McBride – you can tell a man by the company he keeps. As I watched the empty conference hall on TV being filmed by the TV cameras from angles to make it look full I just had to laugh out loud.
I have never seen a worse conference from any party – where was the debate?
It’s over for Labour I fear unless we dump that loser of a leader and that will only be contemplated when we slip below the Lib Dems in the polls.
Can we please stop moving the deckchairs and sort this mess out.
Madasafish
Who is David Miliband?
A former public schoolboy?
Yes
Oh, a Toff…
Ignore him. (according to the C&N Labour leaflets , Toffs are not to be trusted)
Luke
Something we often forget on the left is that many of those in Eastern Europe were victims of an oppressive authoritarian communist regime. Thus there history of the left, particularly the Marxist-Leninist left, is not a pleasant one.
Equally so capitalism has been just as brutal and democracy has proven to be a corruptable system in the ‘new’ democracies of Eastern Europe. It is no surprise therefore that some sections of the population in places such as Latvia, Lithuvania and other Eastern European countries see authoritarian right-wing populism (and at times fascism) as being an attractive alternative to the failures of both an oppressive communism and a corruptable capitalism.
The left just needs to get a better grip of the cultral-political history of parts of Eastern Europe to understand fascist and extreme right-wing tendencies with populist appeals.