Ukip 'would ban balaclavas in public'

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/26/ukip-would-ban-balaclavas-in-public

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Ukip would ban the wearing of balaclavas in public, its deputy leader has said. Peter Whittle said people should be prosecuted if they were found wearing the garments as he set out the party’s manifesto pledge to prohibit face coverings, including the niqab and burqa.

He made the assertion in an interview with BBC Radio 4’s PM programme on Thursday, during which he also insisted that the Ukip manifesto, which promises to “reduce the density of alcohol outlets”, was not proposing to shut down pubs.

Whittle insisted that the face covering policy was not aimed solely at Muslims, despite the manifesto mentioning only the Islamic dress. Asked by the programme’s presenter, Eddie Mair, if it would be extended to balaclavas, he said: “Yes, exactly. You’re quite right – balaclavas. If I were to walk into a public place wearing a balaclava with three or four friends, or whatever, I’d be asked to take it off or asked to leave, I am sure.”

He added that bans on certain face coverings had been successful in continental Europe and said he would like to see people prosecuted for flouting the proposed restrictions, including those on the balaclava. Whittle said the policy on the niqab and burqa was about “female subjugation” and that face coverings were “not conducive to integration”. He rejected the idea that a woman could freely choose to wear either as “almost Alice in Wonderland logic”.

He told Mair: “You are suggesting or you are assuming it’s about their personal choice. This is a robe, this is a form of dress which is actually emblematic of women being second-class citizens.”

He added: “It is simply not part of our value system. We need to see people’s faces. It is simple as that.” Asked why, Whittle said it was “because we communicate by faces”. And he accused Mair of “trivialising” the issue after the presenter pointed out that the pair were conversing from different studios and could not see each other.

Whittle echoed his party’s leader, Paul Nuttall, who announced his intention to propose a ban on niqabs and burqas in April. “I can’t walk into a bank with a balaclava on or a crash helmet. If I can’t do it and other people can’t do it, I don’t see why there are special interests for certain people,” he told the BBC.

Referring to the party’s policy on alcohol sales, Whittle said it was designed to ease the pressure that drinking places on the NHS. The party’s manifesto cites figures from the Institute of Alcohol Studies suggesting that 52% of paramedics, 42% of A&E doctors and about 75% of police officers “have been attacked in the course of their duties” by drunk people.

“To protect emergency workers from abuse, we will repeal the 2003 Licensing Act and bring in new legislation to reduce the density of alcohol outlets and restrict trading times,” it says.

Whittle insisted that that did not mean fewer pubs, though he did not define which outlets would be at risk. “The fact is, we want to have a more structured drinking, if you like, structure that means that, therefore, people are not prone to maybe anti-social behaviour, putting more pressure on our A&E departments,” he told Mair.