Toby Young talks to the journalist and broadcaster Claire Fox about being a Brexit Party candidate in the forthcoming European Parliament election. How did a former Communist become a candidate for a populist, right-of-centre party?
Published on May 1, 2019
Quillette Podcast 30 – Ex-Communist Claire Fox on why she’s standing as a Brexit Party candidate for the European Parliament
Did you have a light shining into her eyes during this interrogation, Toby???
[writing from the Rep. of Ireland] I generally like Claire Fox but this interview made my blood boil. She said the Irish People “had people fighting on their behalf” (in the period up to the Good Friday Agreement), presumably referring to the IRA and other such armed thugs. NOT TRUE! They did NOT have the support of the vast majority of the Irish People! They and their disgusting terrorism had NO Legitimacy whatsoever.
She did not disavow her support for the illegimate (so-called) ‘armed struggle’ in Northern Ireland. So much for her respect for democracy; she has no credibility.
P.S. Is the Quillette podcast going to be merely part of the Brexit movement or do the editors plan to have a Remainer on to give an alternative view?
[Son of irish immigrants to the UK writes from London] I agree wholeheartedly with the Mr Michael McGrath’s comment. I too am keen to see the Quillette team to publish an interview from the Pro-Remain position with an irish perspective. The field is full of qualified candidates who would give Toby Young a good run for his money and we don’t often hear a well argued Irish case except from Irish politicians who are all slightly constrained by the need to keep the negotiations running.
To fail to do so would I fear leave Quillette looking like a soft conservative mouthpiece, which some unfairly characterise it as anyway.
Brexit is to popular a topic to be argued as a Heterodox opinion, so please provide some balance.
I really enjoyed this interview. I need to listen again but whilst I agree Claire is unfairly accused by the media on various points, I couldn’t help but feel she didn’t answer the question about her views on the IRA bombing in Birmingham, and by extension, other IRA activity at that time.
Does she continue to hold the view that it was justified (for reasons she could potentially put forth) or does she no longer hold that point of view?
Claire Fox’s position is that seeking to overide the decisions of democratically elected governments by killing large numbers of innocent civilians should not be condemmed but that democratically representatives seeking to interpret and resolve the details of a referendum result or having a second referendum to confirm the first is completely unacceptable and anti-democratic an dmust be opposed.
The pattern seems to be that she seizes on some evil in the world, for example ‘colonialism’ ignores all complexity and contrary argument. Those that oppose the evil it become secualr saints whose actions cannot be judged by odinary standards and those that support it become demonic whos eevery actions is malign and immoral. A strangely childish and dangerous moral philosphy.= for someone who regularily appears on a program dedicated to debating moral issues.
This explains how she can campaign against democratically elected MPs seeking to perform their duty by interpreting what Brexit means in detail and describing campaigns for a further vote as ‘anti-democratic’.
Well done to Quilltte for giving her a platform to demonstrate how vacuous, self serving,hypocritical and immoral she is.
I found this podcast when searching for news as to whether Toby Young was indeed standing for the Brexit party, as I’d heard him say he would “if they’ll have me”. Would they not have him then? or did he succumb to the doubts that Claire said she’d had? I wouldn’t blame him. I was surprised it didn’t come up.
I agree with Claire Fox in almost everything she says, I remember agreeing with her long before I even knew who she was.
I was really pleased to see her in the line-up of prospective MEPs, she’s just what’s needed in there, an articulate and committed upsetter of self satisfied, entitled apple carts.
These are very strange times. I am one of those plodding rural conservatives who’ve “always been a bloody tory”, as I heard an old guy in a large tweed cap say in a newsreel from the post war election, when Attlee thrashed Winnie.
I first encountered a representative of the (kind of) libertarian wing of the Communist party at the first Countryside march in 1996 (haven’t been to London since), when I saw a shabbily attractive young woman selling LM magazine, I didn’t get much out of her except she felt it was wrong to ban things that did people no harm which, I thought, is pretty solid ground to be on.
I too disagree with Claire on the good old Irish question.
For what it’s worth, I reckon that a whole new Pandora’s box would be opened up by the re-unification of Ireland. A lot of Ulster protestants are of naturally pugnacious western Scottish ancestry and wouldn’t just shrug their shoulders and accept it.
Anyway, as a Lancastrian Brexiteer living in Scotland, I consider her to be as sound as a bell on this issue and as I’ve not got many visible allies up here, there are plenty around but it’s like the Dutch resistance in the war, you think you might know who they are but if you’re wrong… so I rely on podcasts such as this to bolster me up and prepare my loins for girding to face the battles ahead.
It really is most invigourating to see so many people from all walks of life and all ethnic backgrounds unifying on this issue of the betrayal of Brexit. It’s such a hugely important thing and it’s so good to know we have right on our side.
We won.
I feel that this is partly why the remain side are so agressively hostile to us, they know deep down that they’re wrong to try to overturn a democratic vote, it’s almost the naughtiest thing you can do in a democracy.