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UKIP MEP threatened with arrest for telling truth to European Parliament

UKIP MEP Nigel Farage, the co-president of the Independence & Democracy Group in the European Parliament, was this morning threatened with legal action by the Parliament’s President for telling the truth about the French Commissioner designate, Jacques Barrot.
18-11-2004

For Immediate Release – 12:00hrs 18th November 2004

UKIP MEP threatened with arrest for telling truth to European Parliament

UKIP MEP Nigel Farage, the co-president of the Independence & Democracy Group in the European Parliament, was this morning threatened with legal action by the Parliament’s President for telling the truth about the French Commissioner designate, Jacques Barrot.

Mr Farage had asked fellow MEPs whether they would ‘buy a used car from this man’, when he revealed that M. Barrot had received an 8 month suspended sentence and was barred from elected office in France for 2 years, after being convicted in 2000 of embezzling FFR 25m (US$ 3.8m) from government funds by diverting it into the coffers of his party.

French President Jacques Chirac subsequently granted M Barrot a presidential amnesty, making it illegal under French law to even mention the conviction. However, Mr Farage felt it was proper that MEPs were informed of the past of the Vice President designate, and used his speech in the Strasbourg chamber to do so.

Many French MEPs were not aware of the conviction, as in compliance with French law it was totally censored from the French media.

The President of the European Parliament, Spaniard Josep Borrell, warned Mr Farage that he should withdraw his remarks, as he may face ‘legal consequences’. Mr Farage, who in theory enjoys Parliamentary immunity while speaking in the chamber, refused to do so, and was, amazingly, condemned by other MEPs for telling the truth.

Mr Farage said, “Yesterday, the Court of Auditors refused to sign off the EU’s accounts for the 10th year in a row, because 93.5% of the EU’s expenditure was, in their words, ‘unsafe or riddled with errors’.

“Today, the European Parliament is prepared to overlook the conviction of a senior member of the Commission for embezzling government funds, and is prepared instead to threaten with arrest the person who reveals it.

“What clearer indication can there possibly be of the corruption and hypocrisy which pervades the entire European project from the lowest to the highest levels?” ENDS