Britain First claims to be behind thousands of complaints to Ofcom over 100 Days of Ukip
Far-right group has launched a campaign calling on ‘patriots’ to complain about mockumentary
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Your support makes all the difference.Britain First is claiming to be behind up to a third of the complaints made to a broadcasting watchdog and Channel 4 over the 100 Days of Ukip docudrama.
The far-right group claimed to have made over 2,000 complaints after the Channel 4 programme was aired. It followed fictional Asian MP Deepa Kaur and her crisis of conscience during the first weeks after the anti-EU party is voted into Government.
The controversial drama used a mixture of archive footage and acting to show riots breaking out and factories closing down. It was dismissed by Ukip leader Nigel Farage as “liberal-left poppycock” and is being investigated by Ofcom to determine whether the programme was unduly offensive, misleading, and breached broadcasting rules around due impartiality.
Britain First claims to be a patriotic party aimed at “taking our country back” and regularly films ‘mosque invasions’ and Christian patrols in multicultural areas.
In a campaign on its website, the group wrote: “2188 patriots have complained to Channel 4 and Ofcom about the biased and ridiculous show called ‘100 days of UKIP’, a typical example of leftwing scaremongering.”
It included an online form and urged people to fill out their details and hit the “complain” button to join them.
A spokesperson for Ofcom told The Independent 5879 complaints had been made since the programme aired, but said it could not track how many of these were made by Britain First supporters.
Britain First is a vocal supporter of Ukip and caused the party embarrassment last year when it circulated pictures of members posing with party campaigners.
Ukip strongly denied any association with Britain First and said its campaigners were photographed with one of its ‘mosque invaders’ “without understanding the nature of the group and regret that very much”.
Britain First took this rejection on the chin and released their own statement claiming it was all “a “bluster for the media’s sake”, adding: “Britain First has nothing but the utmost respect for Ukip.”
Channel 4 said in a statement: “We are confident that the programme did not breach the Ofcom code and we will be providing a response to the investigation.”
A spokesperson for Ukip told The Independent: “[It is] nothing to do with us."
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