UKIP to launch manifesto
The UK Independence Party (UKIP) today launches its election manifesto under the slogan “We want our country back”.
UKIP will be asking for the mandate to withdraw from the European Union, which it blames for imposing an “alien system of government” on Britain.
“Real government” in Britain now operates out of Brussels not Westminster, it contends.
“Our purpose is to restore the authority for governing Britain to our elected parliament in Westminster – hardly an unreasonable position,” UKIP leader Roger Knapman writes in the foreword.
He is insistent the party is not obsessed on one single issue.
The eurosceptic party’s manifesto is expected to include pledges to cut taxes by £25 billion as well as increasing state pensions by £25 per week and giving schools more local autonomy.
Withdrawal from the EU will allow for council taxes to be cut for half of all households, UKIP says.
The party downplayed suggestions a swift EU exit would lead to the loss of three million UK jobs linked to exports to the 25-member trading bloc.
Only immigration said it would ensure foreign nationals entering the UK did not outnumber those leaving the land.
UKIP won a large share of the vote in European elections last year (15 per cent).
MEP Nigel Farage said the party’s ambition was to get a “first toehold in Westminster”.
