Why Clive Page is not very happy

Clive Page - UKIP Press Officer and convicted benefit fraudster - is becoming increasingly frustrated at being sidelined by Nigel. All the ‘important’ press jobs - are there any left? - are now handled by Ms Rowe. Poor old Clive is now left with the dross.

Nigel never forgave Clive for failing to support him over the Ms Fuller affair. Nigel is well aware that Clive was glad to see the back of Annabelle ( pictured above) as his working relationship with her had become almost intolerable. Remember her comments in The Independent and The Mail on Sunday?

In the Mail she mentioned an 'irrevocable breakdown in working relationships with my closest colleagues’. She was, of course, referring to Clive Page.

Clive was also bitterly opposed to the Farage approved attacks posted on Robin Page’s blog by Bob Feal-Martinez and Ms Fuller. Clive correctly surmised that such attacks would make Robin even more determined to criticise the leadership of UKIP in future editions of his blog. Naturally Nigel did not agree.

Over the coming months Clive will be pushed more and more into the background. After June - if he lasts that long - expect to see him seeking pastures new.

Here is the original article on Clive Page's benefit fraud conviction:

Ex-hack shamed over scam by Simon Armstrong, The Evening Chronicle, May 20th 2004.

A former Tyne Tees TV manager claims he has been left penniless after admitting swindling thousands of pounds in a benefits scam.

Clive Page, 60, dishonestly claimed more than £5,000 in housing benefit and council tax for a flat on Newcastle Quayside which he didn't live in.

Despite having moved out of the property at the Watergate Buildings and sub-letting it to another tenant, the 60-year-old claimed the cash between July 2002 and July 2003.

Magistrates at Gosforth gave him an 80 hour community punishment order after his solicitor claimed he was a ruined man with barely a penny to his name.

Defending, Ruth Foster said: "He has been a highly-respected man. His one foray into the world of crime has led to his ruin."

Page moved to Tyne Tees in 1978 and ran their news and sport from 1982 after starting his career at the Chronicle. He was sacked from Tyne Tees in 1988 as part of a departmental re-shuffle.

Page, who is living at his partner's home in Sandhoe, Hexham, had previously pleaded guilty to making two false representations in order to claim £3,543 housing benefit and £1,943 council tax benefit. He also admitted providing a false statement which claimed he was living at the Quayside flat.

Prosecuting, Kerry Walker outlined the case against him: "Between July 2002 and 2003, he told the local authority he was living at the Watergate Building."However, on those dates he was sub-letting that property for £500 per month. In effect, he was claiming housing and council tax benefit for a property he was not living in."

See the original article at: Ex-hack shamed over scam Evening Chronicle (Newcastle, England) Find Articles at BNET