Brexit Party MEP brands EU 'white slave masters' who only let black people in to clean toilets

Ellen Manning
Updated
Brexit Party MEP Matthew Patten (left) made the comments after Ursula von der Leyen took over from Jean-Claue Juncker as president of the European Commission. (Twitter/PA)
Brexit Party MEP Matthew Patten (left) made the comments after Ursula von der Leyen took over from Jean-Claue Juncker as president of the European Commission. (Twitter/PA)

The EU is “institutionally racist” and only lets black people in to clean the toilets, a Brexit Party MEP has claimed.

Matthew Patten, who was elected as an MEP for the East Midlands in July during the Brexit Party’s sweeping victory in the European elections, accused the EU of being “white slave masters” and said the organisation operated an effective ‘apartheid’.

He made the comments as EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen laid out an ambitious agenda for the European Commission that she said would centre on the “existential issue” of battling climate change.

Mr Patten said he voted against the new European Commission - which was approved on Wednesday (November 27) - because he believed the appointments reinforced his view “that the European Union is institutionally racist”.

Brussels, Belgium - July 30, 2014: Row of EU Flags in front of the European Union Commission building in Brussels.
The EU is institutionally racist, a Brexit Party MEP has claimed (Picture: Getty)

He said: “Ten per cent of Europe’s population comes from a racial or ethnic minority but there’s never been a black commissioner here. There’s no-one of any colour in any senior management role. No black person employed by the EU has ever spoken to this parliament.

“This is not Europe united in diversity. It’s an apartheid.

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“Here black Europeans are not segregated by the bus they travel on, they’re segregated by time.

“During the day the EU is for white people. At night we let the black people in to wash the floors and clean the toilets.”

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen poses with new members of EU Commission after the vote of Members of the EU Parliament on her college of commissioners, in Strasbourg, France, November 27, 2019. REUTERS/Vincent Kessler
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen poses with new members of EU Commission (Picture: REUTERS/Vincent Kessler)

Mr Patten, former chief executive of the Mayor’s Fund for London, said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen could have insisted commissioners were people of colour or could have instructed it to change its employment practices and hire and recruit more black people.

But he added: “The president boasted in her speech yesterday about changing the face of the commission but only I believe as long as those faces are white.

“The EU is institutionally racist and I won’t vote for those white slave-masters.”