Green Party activists in Brighton Pavilion were caught ripping UKIP adverts out of copies of the Brighton and Hove Independent.
They were captured on closed-circuit television by a security camera at Sussex Heights as they tore the front-page ad out of dozens of copies of the free weekly newspaper.
The newspaper has uploaded the video to YouTube where it has already been viewed more than 18,000 times in a few days.
To read the newspaper’s report of the incident, click here.
The newspaper said: “Quickly and neatly, they tore out every single one of the UKIP advertisements. One suggested they could come in handy as toilet paper. Another said she was not so fracking desperate.
“It sounded like fracking, anyway.”
The activists were in town to support the campaign to re-elect Caroline Lucas as the Green MP for Brighton Pavilion.
When the newspaper showed the video to party officials, the response was: “We know that passion is important in politics. But however strongly we oppose the policies and rhetoric of UKIP, we will condemn any attempt to prevent them from having their fair say in this election.
“Opposition is crucial to democracy and something we have consistently championed. If these campaigners are connected to the Green Party, we apologise, as their actions in no way reflect its values or position.”
Kevin Smith, UKIP’s parliamentary candidate for Hove, described the incident as “absolutely disgraceful”.
He said: “This is yet another attack on UKIP election material, of the sort that is a common occurrence. Only this time the culprits have been caught red-handed.
“All the other parties – not just the Greens – are desperate and don’t want to discuss UKIP. They like to portray us as undemocratic and racist. Which are complete lies.”
Clarence Mitchell, the Conservative candidate in Brighton Pavilion, said: “This just confirms the very ugly, anti-democratic depths to which Green activists will often stoop in continuing to inflict their political vandalism on Brighton.
“They are far from the idealistic, peace-loving environmentalists that many still fondly imagine them to be.”
Not very democratic..
Always good to see the calibre of the supporters of the green party.
A party that fully supports diversity; the right of free speech; and the right of free thought – just as long as you agree with what they say and with what they think!
I wonder if Tom Druitt is getting his staff to remove the UKIP adverts from copies of the Brighton and Hove Independent that he freely distributes on his Big Lemon buses?
As much as I would like there to be no advert for UKIP in these newspapers, this is totally unfair and a very poor move by the Greens.
How would the Greens like their ads removing from a paper, or someone to go around removing the Green boards that have appeared in gardens across the city.
They’d be the first to complain if this happened.
We might not agree with what UKIP have to say, but we do not have a right to remove their legitimately placed ads.
This does nothing more but show the Greens as caring little about doing the right thing, but determined to run an underhand campaign to cling to power at all costs.
We need to let them know this is NOT acceptable – the best way to do it is to vote against the Greens this Thursday.
Combine this with the only just legal use of pre filled in Proxy voting forms by the Green party at the uni and you start to get a picture of how they do business. I hope that the leaders of the opposing parties will be demanding that the chief executive exclude all proxy voting forms with a x for the green candidates as they are compromised and invalid. I know I will.
A lot of Greens are like Melons…..green outer but very red inside…..in other words probably a lot of extreme lefties. That said I despise the current Tories especially IDS and that blonde scouse tart.
Let’s be honest, they look like young naïve girls who are passionate about their cause (although misguided it is the shot in the arm politics needs in England). If these girls ever venture into politics, this will haunt them for the rest of their lives and it has damaged Green creditability in Brighton! The question to be answered here is that why do the left leaning parties often resort to these tactics yet champion individual freedoms? The simple answer is an ever present sense of self righteousness, arrogance and hypocrisy at the expense of the good old British value of fair play!
Anti-democratic and indefensible – whatever we think of the ad. We don’t know who these supporters are but clearly it’s not what Greens stand for and I’m very sorry this has happened. As for the papers on the buses; they all have their ads intact!
Tom Druitt
Chair, B&H Green Party
Well done women,
what is needed now is a revolution and our work is almost complete.