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Leader puts on brave face as protesters put on his

IT HAD already been a bad week for William Hague when it suddenly got even worse. In Pudsey.

A walkabout in the town’s market turned to farce when three protesters wearing William Hague masks ambushed the Conservative leader and began jostling him and heckling him with shouts of “keep the groat”. Thankfully, Mr Hague’s karate partner, former Olympic athlete Lord Coe, was on hand to keep the protesters at bay, and even made one of them pick up some socks that were knocked off a stall in the scuffle.

Mr Hague’s visit was to support the Keep the Pound campaign, but the protesters also brought up the race row in which the Tories are embroiled, shouting “sack him” in reference to Bridlington MP John Townend.
And even Mr Hague’s attempts to buy a bunch of flowers for his wife were hijacked. As he handed over £10, one shouted “Are those for Mr Townend?”
Mr Hague replied: “They are most definitely for my wife Ffion.”

Black Tory peer puts Hague on the spot in race row

Lord Taylor challenges party leader to withdraw the whip from MP who made `mongrel race' remark

The race row in the Tory party threatened to run out of control yesterday when a black Tory peer, Lord Taylor of Warwick, challenged William Hague to withdraw the whip from the Bridlington MP, John Townend, after he accused ministers of wanting to turn Britons into `a mongrel race'.
Lord Taylor, who endured racist attacks when he stood as a Conservative candidate in Cheltenham in 1992, said: `John Townend is clearly determined to continue spouting his racist rubbish. He is laying down the gauntlet to Mr Hague. The leader of the Conservative party prides himself on his judo and 14 pints a day macho image. Now is his chance to demonstrate real macho leadership by withdrawing the whip from Mr Townend and booting him out of the Conservative party.'
Yesterday morning John Townend renewed his attack on the commission for racial equality, whose anti-racist pact he had refused to sign. Mr Hague, whose fence-mending speech in Bradford was over shadowed by Mr Townend's outburst, repudiated the remarks, but said it was too late to move against Mr Townend, even though another Tory MP, Charles Wardle who is not standing again, had the whip withdrawn earlier this month.
`Taking the whip away from Mr Townend would just be a gesture when he's not even a candidate in the coming election. He's only got a few days left,' Mr Hague said. `I believe in substance, not gesture.'
Lord Taylor dismissed this as a cop-out. `He has caused a great deal of offence, not only to ethnic minorities around the country, but to decent people in England of whatever colour who believe in, and live in, a multiracial, multicultural society.' Mr Townend and others who have refused to sign the CRE pact on libertarian grounds, had claimed victory in the past few days because the argument had become one of free speech rather than racism. But some Tories fear that the defence - a concern raised by some Labour members too - is being used as cover by a small racist element.
Continuing his attack on Mr Hague, Lord Taylor said: `It might be that he is frightened of a certain rightwing element within the Tory party.' And in a scathing denunciation of Mr Hague's advisers, he said the leader was failing to send out a consistent message.
`When people feel uncertain, they tend to shy away, and certainly the ethnic minorities feel very uncertain about what he is really saying. If you feel that a party doesn't want you because of the colour of your skin, you're hardly likely to vote for that party,' he said.
Mr Hague was barracked by protesters wearing masks of the Tory leader as he tried to raise the issues of crime, education and transport in Pudsey, near Leeds.
Lord (Seb) Coe hauled three masked men away from the Tory entourage.
Mr Hague's solitary purchase in the marginal constituency, a £10 bunch of flowers, was greeted with a shout of: `Are those for Mr Townend?' Unruffled, he called back: `They are most definitely for my wife, Ffion.'
Bill Morris, of the Transport and General Workers' Union, last night used his speech to the TUC Black Workers' Conference in Perth to raise his own concerns about race. Referring to the Hague speech, which last month triggered the race row by portraying a future where Britain was a `foreign land', Mr Morris said: `It is indeed a foreign land. A foreign land where ordinary black British families wake up almost every morning to listen on the radio to descriptions of themselves they do not recognise.'

Tory peer denounces Hague's race 'cop-out'

THE Tories’ most prominent black politician fiercely attacked William Hague yesterday for failing to address racism in the party.

Lord Taylor of Warwick, a former Home Office adviser and Tory parliamentary candidate, told his party’s leader to live up to the “macho” image that he liked to portray and expel the Yorkshire East MP John Townend for his remarks on race. Lord Taylor, who narrowly failed to be elected MP for Cheltenham in 1992, said that he had been approached many times to join Labour but had stayed with the Conservative Party in order to change it.
On Thursday Mr Townend wrote to the Commission for Racial Equality, attacking the idea of a “multicultural, multiethnic, multilingual society” and accusing ministers of wanting to make the British a “mongrel race”. Mr Hague, who had already rebuked Mr Townend for earlier remarks on race and immigration, again repudiated his comments, insisting they did not represent party policy.
Mr Hague said, however, that it would be pointless to withdraw the whip from Mr Townend now as he was retiring from the Commons at the general election.
Lord Taylor denounced Mr Hague’s response as a “cop-out” and suggested that he had failed to act because he was “frightened of a certain right-wing element” in the party.
“John Townend is clearly determined to continue spouting his racist rubbish. He is laying down the gauntlet to Mr Hague,” Lord Taylor told BBC Radio 4’s The World at One.
“The leader of the Conservative Party prides himself on his judo and 14-pints-a-day macho image. Now is Mr Hague’s chance to demonstrate real macho leadership by withdrawing the whip from Mr Townend and booting him out of the Conservative Party.
“It’s no good saying he’s only got a few days to serve and it doesn’t really matter — it does matter. He has caused a great deal of offence, not only to ethnic minorities but to decent people in England of whatever colour who believe in and live in a multiracial, multicultural society.”
Lord Taylor also accused Mr Hague, who sparked controversy with his recent speech suggesting that Britain was becoming a “foreign land”, of inconsistency on race issues. “He will say one thing one day and another thing the next day, and people feel uncertain as to where he really stands.”
Mr Hague was not a bad man but was surrounded by people giving him bad advice, Lord Taylor said. “There is a battle within the party. There are those who realise Britain is changing, that we are multiracial, multicultural; who realise we need to welcome ethnic minorities, more women, younger people. And there are others who are not really living in the modern world.”
The Conservative leader, campaigning in Pudsey, near Leeds, was yesterday jostled by three demonstrators against Mr Townend’s comments. Lord Coe, the former athlete and Mr Hague’s chief-of-staff, had physically to restrain one of the protesters.
Mr Hague defended his decision not to expel the MP. “Withdrawing the whip at this stage is a gesture and I think what we need here is not a gesture, but to make clear what the Conservative Party stands for,” he said. “We oppose racism in all its forms. We believe that the multicultural nature of Britain is one of the strengths of Britain today.”

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