LORD Ken Maginnis has said he hopes the United Kingdom’s departure from the European Union will “restore our Britishness and free our nation from the gross bureaucratic diktat that undermines our parliamentary democracy.”
The former Fermanagh-south Tyrone MP said during his 34 years in Parliament and subsequent 12 years in the Ulster Defence Regiment he has never been more anxious about “the state of our nation as I am today.”
He said the country has “become victim to catchphrases that are being perverted on a daily basis.”
“Terms such as liberal and equality,” said Lord Maginnis.
“I was never ashamed to be labelled a liberal unionist, even when that was not fashionable, or to argue for equal opportunity,” he said.
“Those who worked with me since pre-1970 know my record over almost 50 years. 
“However, we are now witnessing equality being relegated to little more than a cliché. It becomes inequality, where every small faction or clique can demand, collectively, virtual control over traditional resources and rights that are totally out of proportion to their numbers,” he said.
And during his contribution to the House of Lords, he rejected the criticism that has faced Prime Minister Theresa May since the Grenfell tower fire tragedy which left scores of people dead and injured.
He said some of the subsequent media coverage was “based on provocation and confrontation rather than sound analysis.”
“The simple deceit is that Prime Minister May was no more responsible than any of us here for the cladding on Grenfell tower block, no more than she or any of us could be deemed responsible for the flood or the black plague,” he said.