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'Marriage caused floods' councillor suspended

Tue 21 Jan 2014 In: International News

David Silvester A councillor from the UK Independence Party has been suspended after bizarrely blaming Britain’s floods on marriage equality. Oxfordshire representative David Silvester sent an open letter to newspaper the Henley Standard, in which he blamed the recent heavy floods across Britain on the government and particularly the Prime Minister who has acted "arrogantly against the Gospel.” He said that since marriage equality came into force, the nation has been “beset by serious storms and floods,” the councillor wrote, adding that it is Cameron’s fault that the nation is distressed by bad weather. Quoting the Bible, the politician went on to say that “no man or men, however powerful, can mess with Almighty God with impunity and get away with it” and that “a Christian nation that abandons its faith and acts contrary to the Gospel will be beset by natural disasters.” UKIP leader Nigel Farage said Silvester was entitled to his "strong Baptist view of the world", but had defied a request not to do further media interviews. "So we suspended him, quite rightly." The outburst has led to a Twitter parody “UkipWeather” account being set up, with tweets such as “A lingering look between 2 men at a gym in York has sparked concerns from residents living near the River Ouse” and “David Silvester has started to question his faith following the appearance of a rainbow over Henley-on-Thames”. The account already has nearly 90,000 followers.     

Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff

First published: Tuesday, 21st January 2014 - 8:49am

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