| Godfrey Bloom MEP | |
|---|---|
| Member of the European Parliament for Yorkshire and the Humber, UK |
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| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office 1 May 2004 |
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| Personal details | |
| Born | 22 November 1949 London, England |
| Nationality | British |
| Political party | UKIP |
Godfrey Bloom (born 22 November 1949 in London)[1] is a Member of the European Parliament for Yorkshire and the Humber for the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP). He was first elected in 2004, and re-elected in 2009.
Before becoming an MEP, Bloom worked as a financial economist.[1][2]
Godfrey Bloom is the president of the European Alliance for Freedom, a eurosceptic pan-European political party.[3]
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In 2004, Bloom's election to the Yorkshire and the Humber seat was the UKIP's first seat in the region in the European elections.[2]
A few weeks after his appointment to the European Parliament's Committee on Women's Rights and Gender Equality on 20 July 2004, Bloom told an interview in Strasbourg that, "No self-respecting small businessman with a brain in the right place would ever employ a lady of child-bearing age. That isn't politically correct, is it, but it's a fact of life. The more women's rights you have, it's actually a bar to their employment."[4] Around the same time, he was reported as commenting that: "I just don't think [women] clean behind the fridge enough," and continued on saying "I am here to represent Yorkshire women who always have dinner on the table when you get home."[5][6]
Bloom told BBC Radio 4's Today that his comments were "said for fun" to illustrate a more serious point, that equal-rights legislation was in fact putting women out of work.[6] Bloom claimed that MEPs had "little or no business experience" and did not understand the consequences of their actions.[6]
Bloom is a prominent non-believer of anthropogenic global warming. He stated in 2009: "As far as I am concerned man-made global warming is nothing more than a hypothesis that hasn't got any basis in fact. Every day more scientists are modifying their initial views." [7] He claims that the consensus opinion of scientists about climate change is a "Scam Scam Scam!" of "climate crooks".[8]
Bloom was filmed at the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen congratulating the French for bombing the Rainbow Warrior, a Greenpeace ship, in 1985. Bloom's comment prompted outrage from the environmental group, which accused him of "celebrating" the killing of Dutch photographer Fernando Pereira in the bombing in Auckland. Bloom was filmed posing in front of the present Greenpeace flagship, Rainbow Warrior II, during the climate summit at the Copenhagen harbour. In the footage, he said: "Here we have one of the most truly fascist boats since 1945, Well done the French for sinking (it)." The video appeared to have been uploaded to Bloom's YouTube channel Goddersvision on December 16 during the last days of the summit, but was later taken down.[9][10]
On November 24, 2010 Bloom was ejected from the European Parliament after directing a Nazi slogan at a German MEP Martin Schulz as the latter was speaking during a debate on the economic crisis in Ireland. Godfrey Bloom interrupted Schulz and said "Ein Volk, ein Reich, ein Führer" - one people, one empire, one leader.[11] This was reference to the European Union increasing its powers in the midst of the Euro crisis, making a comparison to that of Nazi Germany.
He was then removed by the President of the European Parliament, Jerzy Buzek, who told Bloom: "As you know, most of the members of the chamber cannot accept your behaviour. I will therefore ask you to leave the chamber at this point.".
This decision generated heavy protest from Barry Madlener, a representative of the Dutch Freedom Party, who noted that Schulz had himself recently referred to fellow MEP Daniël van der Stoep (also a member of the Dutch Freedom Party) as being ´a fascist´ for which Schulz himself was not removed. On the same day, Bloom published the following statement on his web page: "'My father spent 5 years of his youth fighting the ideals of the fascist Schultz. I need make no apologies on behalf of my late father or myself for telling the truth.'"[12]
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