28
Jun 2024
The social conservative looking to preserve Skipton and Ripon's heritage
The Stray Ferret has spoken to all the candidates running for election in the Skipton and Ripon constituency and has been running features on each of them. Here, Guy Phoenix of the Heritage Party talks about what his priorities would be if elected.
When Guy Phoenix stood for the Heritage Party at the Selby and Ainsty by-election last summer, he garnered 162 votes, taking 10th place behind the Monster Raving Loony Party.
But this time he thinks he’ll do better. It is, he says “a learning process”.
He told the Stray Ferret:
I relied too heavily on handing out leaflets. This time, I want to engage with people. I want to find out what the local issues are on the ground.
He has a lot of engaging to do – in the north, awareness of the socially conservative Heritage Party, which originated in the south, is low, and he’s up against some strong performers.
So why is he standing, when his chances of winning the seat are so slim? He said:
I don't think government or opposition have been behaving in the interests of the British people in any way, shape or form. And rather than sit in the pub and moan about it, I'm going to stand up and say something about it.
As a business owner who employs 14 people at sites in Skipton, Ripon and Leeds, he has a strong interest in helping small businesses, which, he points out, make up 94% of the businesses in the UK.
He said:
All you hear every politician in Westminster, Scotland and Wales talk about is how small business is the lifeblood of the British economy. But they go out of their way to tie their hands with over-taxation, over-regulation, business rates – the list goes on and on. To say small businesses are being stifled and almost suffocated out of existence would be understatement.
His remedy would be to reduce and eventually abolish VAT and to bring down business rates, if not abolish those too. He said:
When we've got so many digital online businesses, business rates are effectively a tax on businesses that happen to have bricks-and-mortar premises.
In terms of regulation, it's just off the charts, and I think this is a symptom of the ever-increasing size of the state.
One area where he would like to see more control is water quality; he’d favour making water company directors criminally responsible for any sewage dumps into rivers such as the Nidd in Knaresborough. He said:
People in senior positions need to be held accountable for this stuff. That would focus minds.
Another thing he would like to see regulated far more strictly is the flow of migrants to the UK. People arriving with valuable skills would be welcome, but the next consideration would be “how we deal with them once their work is finished”. He said:
My view would be, if you've worked here for five years and paid taxes and you haven't got into any trouble – if you're a good citizen – and you want to apply for British citizenship, then you’re in. No brainer.
Others who would be permitted to live in the UK would be “genuine refugees”:
That's British values. That's how we approach things.
But as far as the ‘small boats’ go, he favours an Australian-style system of shipping ‘illegal’ arrivals back to the shore they came from. He said:
The navy needs to patrol the Channel and stop the boats, and if they do get through, we need to have the army on the shore to arrest them and put them on a boat to go straight back.
If that sounds as if he’s preparing to repel an invasion, it's because, he said:
It is an invasion. It’s not an armed invasion, but it is an invasion. Ultimately, the armed forces’ job is to protect our borders, to protect the realm.
Once they see that we’ve got the commitment and the spine to stop it, they’ll stop trying. It’ll take a matter of weeks.
As far as law and order go, he favours a stronger police presence in urban centres to help restore public confidence. Conversely, he wants the police to stop going after what he sees as “soft targets”. He said:
They're going knocking on doors of people who've sent an offensive tweet. This has got to stop. We're committed to getting rid of hate crime legislation.
We've reached a point now where people are being arrested for standing outside abortion clinics and silently praying. It's almost 1984 come to reality. It's horrifying.
In the field of education, he would like to see the withdrawal of government funding for university courses that don’t lead to what he terms “proper degrees”, although he could not name any course that this applied to.
He would also like to see an end to the “sexualisation of children” in schools, and mentions “queer theory, gender fluidity and radical thought and gender ideology”, which he says children are being exposed to. He said:
There are two sexes: male and female. If you want to identify as a cat, OK – fill your boots – but it doesn’t change objective reality.
Pride Month does the opposite of what it purports to do. It's meant to be inclusive, but in fact, it creates further division. My homosexual friends are simply mortified by it, and a lot of people find it offensive. Please just stop pushing from forcing it down our throats.
Perhaps surprisingly, given the socially conservative views which are informed by his Christian faith, he is for gay marriage and adoption. He said:
That doesn’t necessarily reflect the party's views, but this is about 'live and let live’. If you happen to love someone who's the same sex, that's fine. That's your choice and that’s your life, and that's how it should be. I think that’s settled.
If these policy positions seem at all reminiscent of Reform UK, that may be because the two parties are “close”, according to Mr Phoenix.
In fact, if he couldn’t vote for the Heritage Party, he said he would vote for Reform. The only things stopping him are Reform’s stances on covid lockdowns – Reform accepted at least one of them, while he was angry about all three – and its position on Ukraine.
Reform has said it would continue to send weaponry to support Ukraine’s war against the Russian invasion. In contrast, he would call for immediate peace talks and allow Russia to keep the Donbas and Crimea.
Asked if that would embolden Mr Putin, he said:
I'm not going to be drawn on that.
The full list of candidates for Skipton and Ripon are as follows:
Malcolm Birks, Labour
Andy Brown, Green Party
Simon Garvey, Reform UK
Ryan Kett, Yorkshire Party
Andrew Murday, Liberal Democrats
Guy Phoenix, Heritage Party
Julian Smith, Conservative
Keith Tordoff, Independent
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