Talk:The Freedom Association

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Untitled[edit]

I don't think it is necessary to list the entire management committee in the infobox as this makes it untidy. The list may be subject to change and can be read on the TFA Website anyway.

(Goldmanuk (talk) 18:08, 24 November 2007 (UTC))[reply]

Ref 4 is unreliable[edit]

The source is the TFA themselves. The sentence: 'The TFA also speaks out in defence of free speech and civil liberties[4].' is contentious. It should either be deleted, or, as the source is the TFA, be amended to: The TFA also claims to speak out in defence of free speech and civil liberties[4]. My word 1967 (talk) 00:10, 25 August 2009 (UTC)[reply]

"During the 1970s the power of the UK trade union movement was considered by some to be excessive and out of control." - these are weasel words —Preceding unsigned comment added by 77.100.163.203 (talk) 13:22, 23 October 2009 (UTC)[reply]

Seems you're still trying to make excuses for Margaret Thatcher! 81.152.156.70 (talk) 12:24, 16 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

charmless?[edit]

TFA is charmless? This is only the personal opinion of one lefty-liberal Guardian hack, is it really appropriate to include it the introduction? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.151.53.154 (talk) 16:01, 24 October 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Apologies for the delay in response. The introduction should describe the organisation and nothing I have seen suggests Marina Hyde is anything other than a serious journalist, the granddaughter of a respectable Tory politician.

There is a case to be made for deleting or at least severely cutting down this whole article. The Wikipedia policy on reliable sources is clear, "If no reliable third-party sources can be found on a topic, Wikipedia should not have an article on it."

I suspect this is unfair as TFA may have been important once but where are the newspaper articles, Times Telegraph, Guardian, Independent, or news websites such as the BBC?

I can't find them and I have certainly looked.

If it isn't possible to find any suitable articles, I will seek advice from experienced political editors about what can be done.

Regards JRPG (talk) 18:52, 2 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I don't really understand your argument about a lack of reliable sources. We have a number of academic publications in the article references, plus there seem to be plenty of Google News results. Cordless Larry (talk) 07:46, 3 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hi Larry.

On other Wikipedia articles, the references point to much larger articles about the topic. The exact opposite is true here. Most references contain at most, a single relevant sentence.

1 was a snippet from the Guardian in an article primarily about N Korean football.

2 seems to make little sense on its own. It starts off by saying the new Right is difficult to describe and then says it’s difficult to decide who to include. Two snippets in a long book, I didn’t learn much!

3 mentions TFA has several Tory members, that Tebbit had praised the organisation and Van Straubenzee had accused TFA of infiltration. Again very short.

4, 5,10,11 are primary sources and unsuitable for anything other than uncontroversial details such as location and leadership.

6 and 9 are dead or invalid links. 9 is particularly important yet I can find no trace of it and it doesn’t appear to be the normal Telegraph format. It is well worth trying to find this.

7 Mentions TFA in one sentence in connection with cricket sanctions.

8 is a much longer and very critical article. However I have doubts about its objectivity.

10 seems to be a university of Essex student newspaper. I couldn’t find the TFA reference,the website kept crashing and it isn’t professionally edited. If it wasn’t worth a local newspaper article then it isn’t noteworthy.

12 is almost entirely about English Defence League with a snippet about TFA being concerned to avoid association with them.

The lack of any newspaper articles about TFA suggests it isn't particularly significant. I'm also concerned about whether you or other editors have a conflict of interest.

Regards JRPG (talk) 21:29, 3 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that most of the sourced only mention the organisation in passing, but there are some out there that have it as their main subject, such as this BBC article. I don't have a conflict of interest. Cordless Larry (talk) 22:17, 3 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No offence intended re conflict of interest. Your BBC link is by far the best I've seen. What a pity the people that wrote TFA didn't start off using it. Here's another one that may be of interest. JRPG (talk) 20:37, 4 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the source suggestion, but I don't see any mention of TFA in it. Cordless Larry (talk) 20:43, 4 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Good technical point :) On 14th September I removed the words

"In February 2010 the TEA party movement of the UK was launched by Daniel Hannan, and TEA party protests have been held across the UK since.^{[citation needed]} The TEA party campaign aims for lower and fairer levels of taxation."^{[citation needed]}

as Hannan may not have wanted to be associated. This new reference shows Hannan warning about attempts to link the Tea party with the English Defence League which would I think fit in with the final section. However none of this was explained.

Regards JRPG (talk) 12:54, 7 November 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Council[edit]

Do we really need a long section based on a wp:primary source? By all means mention some notables -if there is a secondary source showing they are members but the earlier list appeared to include students. JRPG (talk) 08:25, 11 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Agreed. We could perhaps trim it to a prose list, saying that the council includes members such as... Cordless Larry (talk) 13:13, 11 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

How about ..

The council includes Simon Richards, Director,Professor Timothy Congdon CBE, Honorary Chairman,Christopher Gill RD, Honorary President,Vladimir Bukovsky, Honorary Vice-President,Christopher Chope OBE MP

MPs Philip Davies,Robert Halfon,*Philip Hollobone,Gerald Howarth, John Whittingdale, Andrew Rosindell.

MEPs Daniel Hannan MEP, Roger Helmer MEP,Brian Monteith

Former leader of UKIP Malcolm Pearson, Baron Pearson of Rannoch

— Preceding unsigned comment added by JRPG (talk • contribs) 09:02, 12 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Sounds good to me. Cordless Larry (talk) 13:07, 12 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nelson Mandela 70th Birthday Tribute[edit]

Could someone with access to the source write up what the rationale was behind TFA's action? The article itself doesn't mention them, it seems a killjoy response without an explanation. Also why they dropped the action. Thanks. JRPG (talk) 09:54, 11 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Have done. Cordless Larry (talk) 12:59, 11 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Article now makes more sense. JRPG (talk) 16:58, 11 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

"Party Links" and references.[edit]

Both Congdon and Gill have both stood albeit unsucessfully for UKIP. Do you agree should this be changed to "but historically many members of TFA have also been associated with the Conservative party and UKIP"? The article is much better for loss of lists. Is there anything you can do about reference 19. Tory MPs sign up to anti-EU campaign. I can't find any hint of it. Regards JRPG (talk) 17:12, 12 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I've fixed the dead Telegraph reference. I think we should probably stick with assertion that historically the main links have been with the Tories, though it might be worth mentioning that more recently, there has been some UKIP involvement. Cordless Larry (talk) 17:43, 12 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm very pleased to see the Telegraph link, the existence of which I was beginnning to doubt. Re the inclusion of UKIP, I don't have a proper date and "recent" is unacceptable. Do you have a date for the first UKIP council member or other similar event?

Regards JRPG (talk) 14:13, 13 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I've no idea. Despite the fact that I've been quite active here, I can't say that I really know that much about TFA other than doing some searches online for articles on them. Cordless Larry (talk) 14:20, 13 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The associations views are libertarian rather than right wing or conservative. Therefore why did Carol Harlow and Richard Rawlings call TFA "an avowedly conservative group" - it is not really conservative, and it certainly isn't avowedly conservative.Royalcourtier (talk) 21:22, 4 October 2013 (UTC)[reply]

According to their website, they are "a non-partisan, centre-right, libertarian pressure group". Cordless Larry (talk) 20:24, 2 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

They've normally had a stand at Conservative party conferences and have a number of Conservative MPs normally regarded as right wing who are members. The same is not true of the Scots Nats, Lib dems or Labour which certainly don't describe themselves as centre right though there are similarities to Ukip. JRPG (talk) 12:31, 4 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

External links modified[edit]

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Finances[edit]

How is this organisation funded ? The article doesn't say and, unlike a charity or commercial enterprise, it isn't obvious. Also, what is its turnover. 86.135.11.52 (talk) 10:46, 2 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Other than the funding from the apartheid-era South African government, which is mentioned in the article, I'm not sure that much is known about this. I'll see if I can find anything. Cordless Larry (talk) 12:25, 2 April 2016 (UTC)[reply]

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