UKIP’s leader Nigel Farage was asked to leave a pub in Bath yesterday, after attempting to use it as a venue to promote his European election campaign.
Nigel Farage was in Bath for a public meeting at the Forum yesterday evening, and spent the day visiting local businesses and exploring the city.
He visited the famous Bell Inn on Walcot Street with his team, as well as a BBC film crew and the BBC’s Chief Political Correspondent Norman Smith.
Having had a drink, and begun talking to people in the pub, the manager of the Bell asked Mr Farage to leave.
Later on, Jamie Matthews, the manager, explained his actions on Facebook: “Just had UKIP leader Nigel Farage and his be-suited henchmen in the pub with a BBC News film crew.
“Avoiding any actual political argument, I told him that he was welcome as a citizen to have a pint – we are, after all, a public house – but it was inappropriate for him to be using our premises for his hustings. I asked the camera man to stop filming.
“Most of the entourage then finished or left their drinks and went outside. They may have continued filming outside, I don’t know, but that is the public highway and they have every right to.
“Martin Tracy of The Framing Workshop said he’d brought them in as he thought it would help raise the profile of Walcot Street. He had the decency to apologise when he realised how inapt that was.”
You can see a clip of Nigel Farage’s visit to the Bell below, including the moment a passer-by took the opportunity to show the BBC’s viewers how he felt about the city’s visitor.
