Nigel Farage’s bank ‘just the start’ with woke Left taking over another industry

Conservative MPs have warned that the “cancel culture” of political voices on the right of politics which saw Nigel Farage lose his politics has also infected the advertising industry and is targeting channels like GB News. A “sinister” leftwing organisation called the Conscious Advertising Network (CAN) , a coalition of more than 180 advertisers, agencies, tech providers and civil society groups, is being blamed for trying to silence conservative voices on the right of politics. Conservative MPs also believe that CAN is a leftwing attempt to silence debate on topical controversial issues around climate change, the migrant crisis and alleged race issues among other areas. CAN boasts of its links with Google and Pinterest in using its advertising revenue streams for companies to close down debate on climate change and Net Zero. It said: “Following 18 months of work with the United National Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, CAN and a coalition of other organisations, in 2021 Google announced a new monetisation policy. Ben Bradley MP wants to protect free speech (Image: Sky News) “For the first time, misinformation that undermines the existence of climate change is no longer monetised through advertising.” On migration issues, it noted: “CAN is proud to have built the case for ethical advertising at the United Nations, with whom we collaborated for its #Standup4HumanRights campaign, highlighting the Seven Key Elements to build narratives on migration and migrants.” There are also concerns that one of the creators of CAN is the hard-left organisation Stop Funding Hate (SFH). It has been linked to antisemitism on more than one occasion and has been running a campaign to get companies to stop advertising on GB News. Just last week it was revealed that Amanda Morris, the community organiser for SFH, had promoted the phrase ‘#FromTheRiverToTheSea’ on social media which is connected to the Hamas campaign for the destruction of Israel. A spokesman for the Campaign Against Anti-Semitism said: “Promoting anti-Semitic phrases like ‘From the River to the Sea’, which calls for the destruction of Israel; urging the media to give a platform to spokespeople from Hamas, an anti-Semitic genocidal terrorist group banned by the UK, are all red flags.’ But Ms Morris said: “I do not consider that the retweets in question are anti-Semitic. I have been critical of some of the actions of the state of Israel, but that does not mean that I am anti-Semitic – on the contrary, I am an opponent of all forms of racism including anti-Jewish racism.” Harriet Kingaby is the founder of CAN (Image: Youtube) Mansfield Conservative MP Ben Bradley MP warned that the bank account closures of people like Nigel Farage are “just the start” of a wider attempt to end free speech. He said: ‘We’ve seen in recent days that the banking sector has been overrun by cancel culture. “It’s deeply worrying that a similar takeover is happening in advertising and that so many household names are being duped by a so-called ‘conscious advertising network’ that we now find out is being run by a bunch of far-left, politically motivated activists at Stop Funding Hate.” Adding his concerns to CAN’s relationship with SFH, he said: “The Campaign Against Antisemitism has said how ‘extreme’ these people (SFH) are so I hope these businesses and agencies cut their links immediately.’ Hastings MP Sally-Ann Hart said: ‘The left love to silence those they disagree with, whether it is banks shutting accounts, or brands choosing to boycott TV channels. “If these businesses and ad agencies want to engage in ‘conscious advertising’, they’d better find another bunch of people to run their marketing strategies and stop outsourcing them to a campaign led by Stop Funding Hate.” On CAN’s association with SFH, she added: “The Campaign Against Antisemitism has said that Stop Funding Hate has an ‘extreme far-left worldview’ so to see the reach they’re having amongst well-known businesses is really sinister.’ Harriet Kingaby, the founder of CAN, denied the accusations levelled by Conservative MPs and also distanced the network from the accusations of antisemitism against SFH. In a statement to Express.co.uk, she said: “CAN is a non-partisan, non-political network of 180 plus advertisers, agencies and civil society groups including the Anti Semitism Policy Trust, End Violence Against Women Coalition, the UN’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights as well as Stop Funding Hate. “Founded to break the economic link between advertising and harmful content, the group is funded by a number of organisations, all of which are listed on our website. “We are an inclusive, not exclusive group, set up to improve the whole advertising industry. As such, we welcome scrutiny, including of ourselves. “We don’t tolerate extremism of any kind, within our network, or more widely in society. CAN exists to be inclusive of all and to address issues of extremism and marginalisation.”