Page 1, 18th March 2005

18th March 2005

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Page 1, 18th March 2005 — Tories drop ‘EU conspiracy’ candidate for Slough
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Tories drop ‘EU conspiracy’ candidate for Slough

BY DAN FRANK
THE CONSERVATIVE parliamentary candidate for Slough has been forced to step down over his stridently antiCatholic views just weeks before a General Election is expected to be called.
Adrian Hilton, who has written that “a Catholic European Union will inevitably result in the subjugation of Britain’s Protestant ethos”, was forced to resign the candidacy for the Berkshire town after Michael Howard said that he found such comments “completely unacceptable”.
Slough is now looking for its third Conservative candidate in just a handful of weeks. Tory officials had to drop Robert Oulds, the party’s previous candidate in Slough, after photographs of him posing with his gun collection appeared in the tabloids. Under the headline “Tory gun nut”, The Sun featured photographs of Mr Oulds lounging on a bed holding a revolver and posing with an AK-47.
Fiona Mactaggart, Slough’s Labour MP, said: “Accusations that the EU is a Roman Catholic conspiracy are usually associated with the extremist fringe of politics. Mr Hilton’s article contains many wild assertions but no evidence and his arguments suggest a profound prejudice against Catholicism. As the government minister with responsibility for working with faith communities I know the importance of tolerance.
“I support Mr Hilton’s right to express his beliefs but he is attacking the faith of other people in a manner which is inappropriate for someone who is seeking to represent Slough with its religious diversity.” She added: “Conservatives in this town have shown contempt for local people with their choice of candidates; first the gun-toting Mr Oulds, now the extreme religious conspiracy theorist.” Ms Mactaggart won her seat in the 2001 general election by more than 12,000 votes.
A spokesman for Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor called Mr Hilton a “conspiracy theorist” and his views “bizarrely unhistorical”.
Mr Hilton, who is unmarried, is the head of politics and philosophy at Slough Grammar School. In the past he has opposed repealing the Act of Settlement and has claimed that Catholics view the Pope as the “supreme ruler of the world”.
Mr Hilton maintains that his comments were taken out of context. “A Protestant view of history is every bit as valid as the Cardinal Archbishop’s,” he argued in defence of his views.
“In this day and age, if one expresses an Islamic perspective it has to be accepted, if one expresses a Roman Catholic perspective it has to be accepted – and yet an assertion of the constitutional position of the Queen and parliament with regards to Protestantism is greeted with derision.” Catholic commentators have responded with confusion to Mr Hilton’s pronouncements on Catholicism and the EU. They pointed to the EU’s growing secularist tendencies, including its position on abortion, its rejection of Rocco Buttiglione as commissioner over his views on homosexuality and its refusal to acknowledge Europe’s Christian heritage in the Constitution.




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