

If I’m the first to write about this then I hope I get some kind of award for investigative journalism (jokes), because I think it’s an absolute corker. But let me tease you for a sentence or two before revealing my full hand….

The facts – UKIP want the UK out of the EU. One of their (undoubtedly many, if you can bear to listen to them blabber on without wanting to chop off your own ears) reasons for this is the fact that they believe immigrants are taking jobs away from native British people. I won’t go into the politics at this moment (read someone else’s blog for that), but after the semi-gaffe of their leader employing his immigrant wife as his secretary, comes the whopper. The party this week unveiled their high-profile poster campaign, one of which features an “out-of-work” tradesman begging with a plastic cup, who we are to assume is British (the tradesman, not the cup). However, the man in question is in fact none other than Irish actor Dave O’Rourke. That’s right. An immigrant.

The implications? Embarrassment for UKIP, and a giggle for the rest of us. Clearly someone didn’t do their homework (I’m not pointing any fingers at a certain German secretary, I promise) in researching the actor’s ethnicity before plastering his handsome face across their anti-EU campaign. And I’m certainly not saying a British secretary would have been any better (although who knows?!). But for a UK political party purported to champion British workers over “unlimited cheap labour” from elsewhere, surely they could have employed a British actor as their poster boy for this campaign? You know, support for British workers and all that?

Maybe I’m being too harsh. Maybe it’s all some sort of convoluted double-bluff to prove their point about the UK being overrun by immigrants. And I’m sure once this blog goes viral, and UKIP’s PR people have produced enough positioning statements to block the Channel Tunnel and prevent any more immigrants entering the country, we’ll be treated to some equally cumbersome explanation of their choice. Either way, for now, I’m grinning (and waiting for my award, thanks).