Paul Nuttall

Paul Andrew Nuttall MEP
Chairman of the United Kingdom Independence Party
In office 8 September 2008 – 8 November 2010
Preceded by	Dr John Whittaker MEP
Succeeded by	Steve Crowther (Chairman abolished, replaced by Executive Chairman)
Member of the European Parliament for North West England
Incumbent
Assumed office 14 July 2009
Personal details
Born	(1976-11-30) 30 November 1976 (age 35) Liverpool, England, UK
Political party	United Kingdom Independence Party
Website	http://www.paulnuttallmep.com

Paul Andrew Nuttall MEP (born 30 November 1976, Liverpool) is the Deputy Leader of the UK Independence Party and Member of the European Parliament for the North West England region.

Education

Nuttall was educated at Savio High School and studied A-Levels at Hugh Baird College in Bootle, Merseyside, followed by a HND in Sports Science at North Lincolnshire College. He holds a BA in History from Edge Hill University as well as a Masters from Liverpool Hope University, specialising in the British Edwardian politics. He earned a Certificate of Education from the University of Central Lancashire.

Background

Between academia and politics, Paul Nuttall lived and worked in Barcelona before returning to Merseyside to lecture history at Hugh Baird College and Liverpool Hope University.

Political career

Paul Nuttall joined the UK Independence Party in 2004 and formed the South Sefton branch in 2005 to enable the party to contest elections in north Merseyside.^[1] This branch has gone on to be one of the best performing branches for UKIP in the North West region and Paul continues to be involved with the branch today. Between 2006-07, he worked as an assistant in the European Parliament to John Whittaker, MEP

In 2008, Nuttall was appointed as Secretary to the fledgling Young Independence, the youth wing of UKIP for the under 35s, a position he held until Young Independence were able to hold their first internal elections at the UKIP Spring Conference in 2009. In September 2008, Nuttall was appointed to his first major national role as Chairman of the UK Independence Party, succeeding then MEP, Dr John Whittaker.^[2] Nuttall held this role through both the highly successful European Election in 2009 where he was elected to MEP and the 2010 General Election where UKIP polled over 900,000 votes before leaving the post in November 2010. Following the election of Nigel Farage MEP as party leader, Paul Nuttall was appointed in November 2010 to the position of Deputy Leader of the UK independence Party ^[3] and from May 2011 was also appointed Head of Policy within the party. He is the youngest person to date to be appointed as Chairman or Deputy Leader of the UKIP, and is the party's youngest ever MEP.^{[citation needed]}

Elections

The first election that Paul Nuttall contested was the Parliamentary seat of Bootle at the 2005 General Election. Paul achieved a result of 4.1% compared to a UKIP national vote share of 2.2%.^[4] At the 2008 English Local Council Elections, Nuttall contested the Derby Ward within Bootle and came second, behind Labour with 38% of the vote.^[5]

In 2009, Nuttall led the UKIP North West list and was elected to the European Parliament. At the 2010 General Election, Paul Nuttall contested Bootle a second time and increased the UKIP share of the vote to 6.1%.^[6]

Oldham East and Saddleworth

Following the High Court decision to declare the election result for the Oldham East and Saddleworth constituency null and void, Nuttall was selected to contest the Parliamentary by-election held on 13 January 2010. The campaign objectives set out by UKIP were to achieve at least 5% of the vote, finish no lower than 4th place and beat the BNP, all of which were achieved, with a result of 5.8% as Labour candidate Debbie Abrahams retained the seat for Labour after an unusually long winter campaign.^[7]

Political positions

As a UKIP MEP, Nuttall campaigns for the UK to withdraw from the European Union and restore power back to Westminster. In line with UKIP policy, Paul is opposed to political correctness and is a member of the Campaign Against Political Correctness. He is also in favour of strengthened links with the Commonwealth and is a member of the United Commonwealth Society.^[8][9] He is highly involved in the UKIP Save The Pub campaign which highlights the issues surrounded the increase in pub closures in England. As part of this, he is strongly opposed to a blanket smoking ban enforced on all pubs and believes that individual landlords should choose whether to make the pub smoke free or not.^[10]

A Roman Catholic, Nuttall opposes abortion and is a member of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC) and has spoken at a number of their events. He is also well known for his stances regarding crime and anti-social behaviour. He has called for tougher prison sentences for persistent re-offenders, drug dealers and violent criminals and for an increase in prison capacity in his region. Controversially, he signed the e-petition which calls for the reintroduction of the Death Penalty for child and serial killers.^[11]

While Paul Nuttall is a committed Unionist, he has called for the introduction of an English Parliament ^[12] and presented the new UKIP devolution policy at the annual conference at Eastbourne in September 2011. He is a climate change skeptic. Nuttall is opposed to the construction of wind farms^[13] and believes in order to maintain energy security and reduce fuel poverty, nuclear power is the only long term option to traditional carbon forms of fuel. He favours banning burqas in public places, citing the use of CCTV and security as his primary reason to take this stance.^[14]

Media

Nuttall is one of the UK Independence Party’s media spokesmen and regularly appears on national radio, including Radio Five Live and Talk Sport. In January 2012 he was interviewed on the Alex Jones radio show in which he warned about the European Union. He also appeared on BBC Question Time on February 23rd, 2012.

References

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Paul Nuttall

• Official website