Nathan Gill, Ukip No 1 in Wales

I don’t want anyone to think I’m picking on Ukip, or indeed, Nathan Gill; but as the BBC and other media have been making clear, these European elections are most definitely about Ukip, and as Mr Gill is the lead candidate, and therefore almost certain to be representing us – we Welsh – in the European Parliament, I have every right to know more about the man, and to present my findings – and indeed my impressions – to a wider audience of potential voters. The best place to start is with what Nathan Gill has to say about himself. Here’s a link to what you see in the panel (click to enlarge).Nathan Gill And for your further delectation, here’s a link to a piece on Ukip I posted earlier this month.

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The first thing that struck me was that this is very badly written, in so many ways. While criticising syntax may be ‘picky’, criticising bad spelling and ludicrous capitalisations is not. For example (final paragraph) there is no ‘d’ in privilege. In the previous paragraph it should be ‘candidates’. How are we to interpret “our Great Nation” (and to which nation does it refer?). Why does he write “Domiciliary and Home Care for the Elderly” when no capitalisation is required? Amazing, that these people, so intolerant of other languages, are so careless with their own.

Over and above these childish mistakes there are other sections that cause amusement or alarm. Let’s start with the funny – well, sort of – bit at the start of the fifth paragraph, where he says, “I am not a career politician”, which is something Ukip candidates have been playing on in this campaign; in other words, ‘Trust us – we are not part of the corrupt system’. Now I don’t wish to go too far in this observation, but this ‘innocent outsider’ ploy was used by the Nazis: ‘Vote for us – we are not part of the corrupt Weimar system’. Yet he ends the preceding paragraph by saying that the aim is to “raise UKIP’s profile as a professional mainstream party”. If Nathan Gill and Ukip succeed in that ambition he will no longer be able to capitalise on his political virginity. In short, there is a glaring contradiction due to whoever wrote this garbage either forgetting what they’d just written or being unable to grasp that contradiction.

Less amusing is this section, immediately before the bit about professionalising Ukip: “I resigned my membership (of the Tories) and joined UKIP in February of 2005 deciding then and there, that this was a fight worth fighting. I was not being asked to stand in the trenches, or storm the beaches of Normandy for my country. This was to be a long and mainly thankless battle to inform the public, and raise UKIP’s profile . . .”. God Almighty! Stand in the trenches! Storm the beaches! What is it with the English Right that it can think of no other way to serve its country than by donning khaki and killing foreigners? We used to be told that this attitude was confined to the extreme Right, the National Front or the BNP, but Ukip now claims to represent mainstream English opinion. If so, God help us!

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How does Mr Gill earn his crust? Because he makes reference to “the family business” I made some enquiries and turned up a number of companies connected with Nathan Gill, four departed, one still clinging to life. The first of the four was Compactor Ltd of Bridlington, in Gill’s native East Riding of Yorkshire, Company No 06329258. Compactor seems to have lasted from July 2007 until March 11, 2011 and the Second Notification of Strike-Off Action in the London Gazette. Other directors were Mrs Elaine Gill (his mother, presumably) and Mr Brian Lynn Quilter. The company was listed as a manufacturer of telegraph and telephone apparatus and equipment.

Another that fell by the wayside was Humview Ltd, of Church Street, Llangefni, Company No 06166193. The other directors were Ms Jana Lyn Gill (wife?) and Mr Richard Bruce Worsey. Humview was Incorporated on March 16, 2007 and the Second Notification, etc was dated May 30, 2009. The third dead company was Picture Perfect (GB) Ltd, back in Bridlington, Company No 05781088. The only other name mentioned, as Company Secretary was, again, Ms Jana Lyn Gill. Picture Perfect first saw the light of day in April 2006 and breathed its last on November 19, 2010 via the London Gazette, departing this mortal coil with debts of just over £11,000.

Finally, we come to Burgill Ltd, Company Number 05076906, which was in the business of ‘letting of own property’ and ‘renting and operating of housing association real estate’. (Intriguing.) This company was also registered at Church Street, Llangefni, with Nathan Gill and his mother serving as directors, but may have operated in Hull. Alas, early in 2009, the company was forceGill Burgilld into compulsory liquidation owing £116,067. On the left you will find a screenshot of Burgill’s life support system just before it was switched off by the Official Receiver in Chester. (Yes, folks, Chester; after a millennium of that city’s parasitism and 15 years of devolution, it seems the Official Receiver for North Wales is still based in Chester.)

So there appears to be just one company with which Ukip’s local hetman is involved that still trades – Gill Enterprises Yorkshire Ltd, Company No 04188257 which, despite the name, has its registered office in Menai Bridge. It was Incorporated on March 27, 2001 and until March 2003 was known as The Pink Panther Resource Centre Ltd. Googling Pink Panther Resource Centre turned up a care home in Hull. Gill Enterprises could be the “family business” referred to in the bio, for his parents were both directors at one time. The only problem being that unless he was an adult student he would have left Coleg Menai around July 1991, ten years before the company was incorporated. Yet there seems to be no contender for the title of “family business” other than this company which currently has just two directors, Nathan Gill and his mother. The business seems to bob along, keeping its head above water, with net worth equalling current liabilities and a few grand in the bank.

All this digging got me wondering about Nathan Gill’s parents, were there other companies that might fit the “family business” label? Well, for a start, and in addition to Compactor and Burgill, Mrs Elaine Gill had also served as a director of Gillshill Ltd, which seems to have enjoyed a lifespan of just two years, from January 1992 until its Final Dissolution on St. David’s Day 1994. The only other director was her husband, Michael Ronald Gill. Though perhaps more interesting from a Welsh perspective is yet another company, Home Comforts (Gwynedd) Ltd, also registered in Menai Bridge, where the other director was again her husband, and she is listed as a ‘care home proprietor’. This company, number 02939007, was registered in August 1994 and dissolved in April 1996.

I don’t profess to know a lot about business and investment, and I can’t afford to pay for the documents that would throw more light on the Gill family’s business ventures (sob!); but it looks a chequered history to me, and I’d certainly like to know more about the disastrous Burgill Ltd. But after all that, I still don’t know what Nathan Gill actually does to support his wife and five children. Perhaps he should have been more specific in his bio rather than making a vague reference to the family business before taking us off to war while painting himself as the political innocent.

UPDATE MAY 29: Since writing this post I have learnt that Gill’s ‘job’ was personal assistant to the Ukip MEP (2009 – 2014), John Bufton. Why so reticent? Perhaps because it would have undermined his claim to not be “a career politician”. At least he’s got a real job now . . . but one he doesn’t want to do!

Additionally, Gill is a Mormon, it seems they have a ‘Meetinghouse’ in Gaerwen, and he may have come to Wales as a ‘missionary’. In my area it’s Jehovah’s Witnesses, a whole congregation, complete with patriarch, decamped from somewhere in northern England. Sometimes this village is under siege as they descend on us mob-handed . . . people diving under tables, turning televisions off, clapping hands over kids’ mouths . . . I know Wales is a third world country but do we really have to suffer white missionaries?

Seeing as Gill belongs to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (to give them their full name, often abbreviated to LDS) what is his attitude to gays and same-sex relationships? Come to that, what does he really think of that pork swordsman extraordinaire, legendary drinker and all round sybarite, his party leader, Nigel Farage? Does he really see him as ‘a bit of a lad’ or a sinner bound for hell?

When you think about it, there’s a few things here we should have been told before the election, but it’s pretty obvious why we weren’t.

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If the Ukip bandwagon isn’t halted soon then, some time after the general election of May 7 next year, the UK could have a Conservative-Ukip coalition government. I say this because many Conservatives are quietly supportive of Ukip, while Tory supporters in the media and elsewhere hope to use Ukip to pull the party to the Right. They believe that encouraging Farage and his cohorts to change the terms of debate on Europe, immigration, and other issues, prepares the ground for a ‘repositioned’ Conservative Party to reap the rewards. Which, again, reminds me of 1930s Germany; and the way in which big business, the army, and other establishment elements thought they could use and control Hitler before disposing of him. It didn’t work then, and England’s own ‘funny little man’ may prove equally difficult to ditch.

Nor should we ignore the fact that Ukip sees itself fighting on two fronts. The first is obviously ‘Europe’ and what it interprets as interference in Britain’s internal affairs, the second is the crusade to keep Britain English. Therefore Welsh identity of any kind, when seen through Ukip rifle sights on this second front, is a threat to the desired social and cultural cohesion. Which is why devolution – despite what Ukip may say publicly – would soon be phased out by a Tory-Ukip coalition government. (With the support of many in the Labour Party.)

For these and so many other reasons we must oppose this irredeemably English party for which Wales and Scotland are merely colourful appendages to be disempowered and eventually integrated. Despite the presence of three gullible Welsh candidates on the Ukip list the one topping that list, the one very likely to be elected, is Englishman Nathan Gil, which is how it must be, seeing as Ukip is appealling primarily to the English living in Wales. If Nathan Gill is elected he will sit in the European Parliament representing English interests . . . but in the name of Wales. This is why the fight against Ukip must not end with this week’s elections.

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Kris

“Amazing, that these people, so intolerant of other languages, are so careless with their own”

“Ukip”

A Black

Look forward to seeing your post

A Black

They did have the same principles as Sinn Fein, not to send their elected representatives to Brussels, in order not to legitimise the place.
When Farage and former friends from the old National Front took charge they got rid of the principles, so they could climb aboard the gravy train
I know I was a bit pissed, the only way to get through question time, but didn’t I read some comments about Gill and a house in Hull last evening?

gogarth

I think these questions should be put to Gill in a public forum, a decent journalist from the Welsh press would be a starting point. I would like to know where he stands on sex equality, equal pay and on those issues already mentioned.

He mentioned you in a tweet Jac so he clearly is aware that you have him in your sights. Perhaps his twitter account being bombarded with these questions would be a starting point.

Bill Chapman

It is a pity that Nathan Gill did not find space in his election literature to mention what is obviously an important part of his life and a contributor to his world-view.

The Mormon Jesus is different from the Jesus of traditional Christianity. Non-Mormons, of course, do not believe that Jesus visited the Americas. Mormons connect the atonement more with the Garden of Gethsemane than with the cross, since they think that is where his greatest agony took place. The Book of Mormon places the birth of Jesus in Jerusalem, rather than Bethlehem. I suspect that Christian fundamentalists in Wales would not have voted for UKIP (if indeed they did) had they known of his religious affiliation. Theological issues aside, we need to know where he stands on abortion, same-sex marriage, debt, welfare, and so on. I suspect I know exactly where he stands.

Gareth Williams (@AReader9)

Mormons consider themselves to be Christian; so it’s not a ‘lie’ for Nathan to describe himself as such. The credibility of such a claim is, of course, up to deliberation.

Bill Chapman

As regards religion, Mr Gill is described in today’s North Wales Weekly News as “a Mormon and staunch Christian”. He’s backing two horses, apparently.

Anonymous

Gill has clearly been less than honest about how he earned a living, and we know why – he wanted to be seen as a ‘man of the people’, not a political full-timer.

But he has also been reticent about his religious beliefs. He’s mentioned that he’s a Christian, but it’s only recently in a piece by Tom Bodden in the Daily Post, that he has stated that he is of the fundamentalist Mormon sect.

Why would he keep that quiet? For the same reason that he didn’t want to reveal that he was already working in politics: he wanted to be seen as ‘just like you’.

Craig

In the near future ukip will return to the tory fold. There are a limited number of people who will vote for them and farage knows hes never going to be prime minister as their leader. Hes too egotistical to accept that. ukip without farage is nothing, they are a one pony trick. So some form of tory/ukip coalition is inevitable. Personally i welcome it, and id love to see them try to shut down the assembly, i cant think of a better way of speeding up the process of devolution. To be honest though, almost any possible political scenario will be a good thing. A right wing coalition in westminster bullying us, forcing spineless britnat welsh labour into an ever increasing welsh national corner, great. An ineffective labour libdem coalition (or just labour) in westminster negating voting welsh labour as a protest vote against a tory govt, great. A plaid govt in caerdydd, great. What we need to remember is that independence for wales is inevitable, the only questions are, how long will it take? what route will we take to get there? And will there still be a viable welsh language by the time we get there?

Interested from a distance

It sppears he doesnt run a business, but is the outgoing UKIP MEP’s PA: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-politics-24444716

DaveDare

I heard mention not so long ago that the Daily Mail was the most popular newspaper in Wales. Even assuming that some of that is due to its demographic being less inclined towards electronic media and therefore disproportionately represented among print media readers, it’s bloody depressing

daffy2012

This is an interesting article about the rise of Englishness. I thought it worth posting.

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014/may/20/england-identity-crisis-english-euro-scottish-elections-ukip-patriotism?CMP=twt_gu

Leigh Richards

on a lighter note you cant but help get the feeling that the ukip campaign is starting to resemble the episode of father ted where the more ted tries to deny he’s a racist the more events conspire to suggest otherwise. so i wouldnt be at all surprised if someone pops out on the stage of ukip’s eve of poll rally decked out like father jack in full nazi regalia.

wonder if there’s any truth in the rumours swirling around on the internet that the rally has been moved to nuremburg!

gogarth

It’s pretty much all been stated, but I have to say Gill comes across as so totally inept. He repeats the same old UKIP soundbites and doesn’t seem to have any original line of thought in his tortoise like head.

Ironically, I agree that a ukip lurch may ultimately help the Yes campaign and the prospect of a ukip/tory coalition may galvanise those who are provaricating as how they should vote.

What I suspect though is Salmon’s comment about the UKIP vote being old england nicely sums up a significant proportion of those who will be voting for them in Wales.

Pwll y Carw (@PwllyCarw)

There was a documentary on the tv last night about two Welsh guys going back to the English midlands 30 years after the miners’ strike. They had been prosecuted at the time for violence at one of the pickets and later found innocent. They were both originally part of the hard core NUM strike team and are now looking for a public enquiry into the actions of the police that day (supported by Mick Antoniw AM).

In the train on the way to the midlands one of them was reading the Daily Mail…

What hope for us?

Leigh Richards

oops judging by the latest poll findings announced on tonite’s ‘sharp end’ i may have been a tad premature in my doomsday 1979 style scenario…..but its still almost too close to call between the tories and plaid, so if people want to avoid the terrible scenario of our nation being represented in the european parliament by two right wing staunchly british unionist parties they have to go out and vote….and vote for plaid….. on thursday.

http://www.itv.com/news/wales/2014-05-19/poll-suggests-tight-european-election-battle/

Aled GJ

OK -it may appear to be counter-intuitive, but I’m a nationalist who actually wants UKIP to do well as this can only serve the national cause here in Wales. It now appears certain that UKIP will top the poll in England, and as they are taking votes from both the Conservatives and Labour, it will surely announce their arrival as a serious national party for England. Despite all the talk about Europe and immigration, I cannot help feeling that Scotland is playing a big part in this success. Voters in England are being emboldened by the growing success of the YES campaign in Scotland, and its ability to challenge the status quo, and there is a growing sense that England should now seek to emulate this process. UKIP’s success in England of course will also serve to further bolster that YES campaign, as traditional Labour voters in Scotland face the ghastly prospect of a Conservative/UKIP coalition for 2015.

And I’m not altogether fazed by the rise of UKIP here in Wales either. Maybe it’s just what’s needed to shake up the cosy consensus in the Bay, where all the parties are “pro-Wales” in a superficial and tokenistic way. The existence of a Greater England party, even in the Senedd itself, could shake these parties out of their torpor and also galvanise the people of Wales in a way we haven’t really seen really since the start of the Assembly in 1999.

The prospect of more people also voting UKIP for Westminster/Senedd elections in 2015/16 also opens up the possibility of voters in places like the valleys abandoning Labour for maybe the very first time. This would then open up a whole raft of constituencies which have previously been fortress Labour, and allow Plaid Cymru potentially to be serious contenders in such places.

UKIP could therefore shake up politics in Wales in an ultimately positive fashion.A rainbow coalition for 2016, featuring even those nasty Conservatives, will seem much more palatable for nationalists this time round, in view of the sure presence that UKIP are likely to have in the Senedd by then.

Leigh Richards

sadly it does indeed now look as if mr gill will perish the thought be ‘representing wales’ in the european parliament when the results are announced on sunday…..as given the momentum ukip seem to have built up in recent months – aided in no small part by the ‘immigrant baiting’ british press – i suspect nigel farage could appear on our tv screens kitted out in a ‘i love hitler’ t shirt and it wouldnt harm the ukip vote too much. thus on current polling it looks likely that 50 percent of the mep’s wales returns this week will be from right wing staunchly british unionist parties.

and while the comparisons might not be obvious i would argue that such a result would rank as the grimmest political outcome in wales since the darkest days of 1979, when the welsh had firmly rejected even the most limited form of self government and the boy soldier keith best took ynys mon on a 12 percent swing for mrs thatcher’s tories.

Thinking Out Loud

Well spotted Jac, even without being elected Nathan Gill is all over the welsh media, he’ll be the new media darling like Rachel Banner of True Wales before him for BBC/ITV Wales after Thursday election for comment on anything ‘controversial’ in welsh politics.

If you need to see the stark contrast between Scotland and Wales in this election, in Wales voters will vote UKIP in their ten of thousands on Thursday while in Scotland UKIP doing well in next week elections across the UK will make 1 in 5 Scottish voters more likely to vote for independence http://www.scotsman.com/news/uk/ukip-success-would-push-1-in-5-scots-to-back-yes-1-3414996#.U3m-iARHlg4.twitter

And I know it wont make any difference but this car crash interview for Nigel Farage last week is refreshing if only to see a journalist call him out on UKIP’s rank hypocrisy rather than throwing the loonies, fruitcakes and racists tag that doesn’t hurt the party’s support http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z4Rq7avG234

Thinking Out Loud

Good point about the Tory UKIP coalition it’s already being mentioned by Scottish bloggers and as one Scottish journalist reminded everyone last weekend Alex Salmond hasn’t started campaigning for Independence yet, so there’s still time for it to be raised.

As for welsh voters who will still vote UKIP after this excellent article and Nathan Gill’s ‘performance’ in the Sharp End debate last night there is simply no more to be said, we might as well shut the Welsh Assembly down and be an English region.

Gareth Williams (@AReader9)

I’m concerned about his ‘qualifications.’ All he mentions is that he attended Coleg Menai. He doesn’t say what subject/vocational course he was studying, not what qualification, if any, he received.

It way sound elitist, although my education is also in further education, but shouldn’t our political representative in Europe have a university education, and a decent degree? It’s possible he only mentions Coleg Menai as a desperate attempt to localise himself, but reading this article on the BBC website: http://bbc.in/1jZ41jA it would appear that he is only capable of parroting UKIP message, and talking in cliches; he even muddles those.

Grumble, grumble I can’t edit my posy.

Paragraph 1: Nor, not Not.
Paragraph 2: May, not Way.

Maybe this is the problem Nathan had. 😉

Jesus! Post!!! My iPhone hates me 🙁

Hahah

Who do you contact with more info?

Anonymous

Thank you I have sent you an email

Bill Chapman

Thank you for the research you have clearly put into this. Sadly (and I mean sadly), UKIP does garner some support from Welsh people and even Welsh-speaking people here in the north. I know that because I have met them while out canvassing for Welsh Labour.

Please don’t tar the Labour Party with suggestions that “some elements” within it want to abolish devolution. I have never heard that point of view in the Labour Party – at branch or constituency level. The strongest view I have ever heard is that there should not be further devolution until the Assembly shows that it can manage its existing powers well.

It is curious that a Yorkshireman could be one Wales’s MEPs shortly.

Finally, I’m sorry that our press here in Wales does not do the sort of investigative work you have undertaken.

Llantrisant

http://www.aipmep.org/Letters/Letters-2014/How_AIP_differ_from_other_anti_eu_parties.php

The above might interest you, Mike Nattrass who split from UKIP and set up his own anti-EU party wants a referendum to see if Wales would like to “rejoing England”.

Jane

I think exactly what you think, only more so… Having had to cross the border for work purposes, i am subject to different parliamentary party broadcasts, there is more than one party over here which is outrightly calling for the abolition of the assembly and the removal of things welsh all to be subsumed into the mantle of Englishness.
Over here i have been subject to outright race discrimination, because I am Welsh and I havent even gone very far… i can still see ‘home’ from my bedroom window… This is why I keep an eye on what is going on at home; as when my contract ends and i come back home I want it to be a country i recognise and where language and culture are valued…

Daley Gleephart

Is anyone allowed to be ditto like Taggart to Hedley Lamarr in Blazing Saddles?

Hedley Lamarr: My mind is aglow with whirling, transient nodes of thought careening through a cosmic vapor of invention.
Taggart: Ditto.

Gill won’t even represent English interests if elected. UKIP MEPs are noted for failing to vote for measures that benefit the UK.

Jane

Sorry, but saw an english independence party broadacast yesterday, they are a BNP splinter group, more so even than UKIP… Fortunately they are not likely to get an MEP, but looks like the BNP are!!!! Xenophobia is really taking hold this side of the dyke and we Welsh are a major target for it, the impression the English media are portraying is that cos of the assembly Wales gets much more money than England, to combat this they do not want to have an assembly of their own… Instead they want to take all our hard won victories from us… And make us all English into the bargain…
It’s the attitude that we only started speaking Welsh after the tourist came into the pub, writ large…
Guess you’ve hit a raw nerve for me… I shal endeavour to be less so in future 🙂