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UKIP Chairman Tony McIntyre has rejected a number of Emergency Motions submitted to the party which called for Tommy Robinson to be considered for party membership, Kipper Central has learned.

The Emergency Motions, which were submitted by a number of UKIP branches in the hope that the party would debate offering Robinson membership, were turned down on the grounds that there would not be time to discuss them at the party’s Conference this week.

In an email to the Scarborough & Whitby branch, which submitted one of the Emergency Motions, McIntyre wrote: “I already have motions in place for the conference. There has only been a 20 minutes slot allocated for motions and this is a very big issue. Sorry to disappoint.”

Robinson hit out at the decision, telling Kipper Central that members being denied a vote is akin to a “dictatorship”, but that he has not lost hope for the party.

He told Kipper Central: “All we’re asking for is the membership to have a vote; this decision should be theirs, not the Chairman’s.

“The Chairman making this major decision on behalf of the party without consulting the members is what I’d expect from a dictator.”

He added: “Despite this decision, I have not lost faith in UKIP. I’ve been overwhelmed by the number of branches submitting motions to let me join the party and by the number of people telling me they’ll rejoin UKIP if I’m allowed in.

“The #FreeTommy movement was not just about me; it was about the working class people of Britain standing up for their freedom! UKIP must realise that they have an opportunity to politicise that movement.”

A motion was originally proposed by UKIP’s Family & Children spokesman, Alan Craig, calling for the party’s ruling National Executive Committee (NEC) to discuss the issue.

This original motion was first accepted for debate at conference, but later rejected by McIntyre on a technicality – the motion was submitted by an individual, not a branch, which McIntyre argued was a breach of the party’s rulebook.

In an email seen by Kipper Central, the party’s Oxfordshire branch submitted an Emergency Motion to UKIP Chairman Tony McIntyre, which is identical to the original motion proposed by Craig and called for the party to offer Tommy Robinson membership.

Kipper Central understands that several other branches have also submitted similar Emergency Motions to McIntyre, including the Scarborough & Whitby branch which voted unanimously in favour of the motion on Monday.

Stuart Abbott, the chairman of the Scarborough & Whitby branch told Kipper Central: “At our branch meeting, there were 13 members present, we had an open debate on the subject after which a secret ballot was taken. The result was unanimous 13 to none in favour of the motion to allow TR to become a member. Prior to the meeting I received two written proxy votes also in favour. There were no other proxy votes.”

He added: “Yes, Tommy Robinson is radical and outspoken about what is rotten in our society – we should not go against our own values of being a radical party by being complicit in denying him a platform to bring this to the attention of the public at large.”

Craig’s motion – and many of the Emergency Motions from branches – all read: “Conference believes that Tommy Robinson is a global figure who stands in the long English tradition of anti-establishment rebels with a cause from Robin Hood to the Suffragettes; admires his campaigns both for #FreeSpeech and to expose the authorities’ decades-long silence and inaction over the industrial-scale child sexual abuse by rape gangs; and requests the NEC to consider offering him membership of UKIP.”

Aaron Foot, the UKIP Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Kingswood – a branch which voted unanimously in favour of bringing Tommy into the party – told Kipper Central: “I am disappointed in Tony McIntyre’s decision not to let the members of UKIP decide whether a traditional working class, patriotic Tommy Robinson should join UKIP.

“At the last Kingswood UKIP meeting, we backed the Tommy Robinson motion for conference unanimously.

“Members’ wishes may be ignored if we are not given a say on Tommy Robinson, which will be a missed opportunity for UKIP to create a mass movement to rock the political establishment just like Brexit.”

A spokesman for the UKIP Oxfordshire branch, which was one of the first to submit an Emergency Motion about Robinson, told Kipper Central that McIntyre is making a “pathetic attempt” to “ignore” the issue.

“The party that now pretends to want to tackle the hard issues, despicable and cowardly ignores the one issue its membership wants to discuss,” he said.

“In a pathetic attempt to ignore the only issue that a huge chunk of the membership wants to discuss, the party chairman is putting the democratic voice of the members at the bottom of his priorities.

“The members own this party, not its officials! UKIP on the Tommy Robinson issue looks cowardly and weak – which we are not. Let the members show they have the balls to tackle the Truth.”

Kipper Central has contacted Tony McIntyre for comment.

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