You-kip on the front bench: UKIP’s deputy leader heckled by student napping on seats

A talk on campus by the UKIP deputy leader ended in “madness” as students allegedly shouted and heckled.

In a bizarre series of events, one student is reported to have heckled the speaker, compared him to Phil Mitchell from Eastenders and sprawled over benches before being spoken to by security.

Mark Stuart, a politics tutor at Nottingham, tweeted that three to four people held a small demo, but a student, rather more dramatically, tweeted that it “descended into madness.”

UKIP’s Paul Nuttall was giving a talk on “The Future of UKIP” as part of a series of guest speaker events about the 2015 General Election.

One student is said to have compared Paul Nuttall to Phil Mitchell (Picture via Twitter: @NottsPolitics)

Student Brett Rickles, who was at the talk and is a member of UKIP and its youth branch, told The Tab a male student lay on the front benches and muttered to himself.

“I personally thought he was extremely drunk or on some kind of drug.  After security came over he claimed he had the right to lie down and they left him to it.

“A few minutes later the talk was over and this man raised his hands in the air and repeated the word ‘bigot’ about six times.”

LOL at the hippy who was trying to exercise his “right to lie down” at the #UKIPFuture talk.

— JENNY (@jennywhojenny) March 28, 2014

He added:

“I also had people behind me…bang their hands on the tables and proclaim ‘UKIP scum’ about three times which was met with claps as well as boos from the rest of the audience.

“I’m just baffled as to how a student at one the UK’s top universities could resort to shouting down someone simply because they have opposing political views.

“He was more than welcome to put a question to Mr Nuttall which could have led to a small debate but he chose not to.”

This picture appears to show security at the talk (Picture via Twitter: @ERobson6)

Jack Beavis, a third year politics student, described a similar series of events:

“Some people dotted around the room started to chant ‘UKIP scum’ at the end of the talk.

“The guy at the front who’d caused a commotion earlier had to be led out by security.

“The protest was small, uncoordinated and needless; purely a distraction from an informative talk and lively question and answer session.”

UKIP in Nottingham (Picture via Twitter: Brett_Rickles)

Some students slammed Nuttall as patronising and dismissive of climate change, and challenged him on UKIP’s position on women and immigration:

He’s actually denying climate change, ‘I’m not overly convinced that man is to blame for the change in the climate’ #ukipfuture

— Fraser (@Fraserrrcee) March 28, 2014

Paul Nuttall patronises Politics degree students by saying they ‘may know who Clement Atlee is’ #ukipfuture

— Bart Williams (@Bart_Williams) March 28, 2014

@NottsPolitics @paulnuttallukip definitely didn’t answer my q regarding insults to women and the position of women within Ukip #UKIPfuture

— Phoebe Greggor (@Phoebe_Greggor) March 28, 2014

If you’re ever lacking the motivation to punch a hole in a wall then go and listen to @paulnuttallukip shout about immigration. #ukipfuture

— Ella Dudzinski (@Elladudz) March 28, 2014