Emmanuel-Jones admires the 40 acres of sprawling lands that make up his farm in Devon, near Cornwall, in the United Kingdom.

TORONTO, Canada:

Jamaica-born British entrepreneur, Wilfred Emma-nuel-Jones, has ambitions of becoming the Conservative Party's member of Parliament (MP) for Chippenham, and the first black candidate to run in that constituency for which he was selected three years ago.

Born in Jamaica, raised in inner-city Birmingham, Emmanuel-Jones went on to careers in television, marketing, and farming. He is known for the British TV series set on his farm in Devon, England, for mentoring young people from the inner city, and for his Black Farmer products, sold across the United Kingdom.

Explore innovation, diversity

He was one of the keynote speakers at the recently held Innoversity Summit 2009, a forum co-founded by Cynthia Reyes and Hamlin Grange in Toronto to explore innovation, creativity and diversity in the media and communications sectors. It was held at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre. Speaking on the theme, 'The Power of Dreams', Emmanuel-Jones, encouraged the audience with snippets from his own life, including his childhood dream of owning a farm which would only be realised some 40 years later.

In light of this, he told the audience the greatest gift they could ever bestow on another, is hope.

Turning to the circumstances of his current bid for office, he said it is unusual but not impossible,

"What is really interesting about standing in that seat is that it's true blue England where blacks are in the minority and in the past if you were a black person with political aspirations you had to go and stand in the seat where it had a very high portion of black people."

"It's quite rare - I'm probably the only one - to have a black person who is actually standing to be the MP of a predominantly white area and so that's what's quite interesting about the situation," says Emmanuel-Jones.

He said traditionally blacks looking to enter politics in the UK, joined the Labour Party, to the effect that the Labour Party was assured of the black vote for the past 50 years.

Many blacks chose not to support the Conservative Party due to its heritage of exclusion, which seemed to have been summed up by the famous 'rivers of blood' speech by party member and MP Enoch Powell.

The 'Rivers of Blood' speech, which focused on immigration and anti-discrimination legislation in the United Kingdom was made on April 20, 1968 by Enoch Powell, the Conservative MP for Wolver-hampton South West.

Work

Since then, Jones says the Conservative Party has had to work hard to show that it has changed, and to signal to black voters that it is inclusive, and a valid alternative to the Labour Party.

But he is not afraid to go against the grain.

To be successful as a black person in the UK or the middle classes, means working in the race industry - the Commission of Equality or around issues of diversity, Emmanuel-Jones says.

Perspective

Jamaican-born entrepreneur Wilfred Emmanuel-Jones (left) engages Trevor McClymont (centre), and newly appointed Jamaican Trade Commissioner, Lawrence Jones, at the launch of the Jamaica Enterprise Network United Kingdom (JEN-UK) at the Jamaican High Commission in London recently. - Contributed photos

But this also means representing the perspective of the Left. He has no interest in the Left with politics which he regards as the 'politics of yesterday'.

"I think that black people who come from the perspective of the right have traditionally sort of hidden themselves away from attention. They haven't really stood up and spoken because they would have been condemned or chastised by the black left."

Now he says there is a change with more Black people comfortable being aligned with the perspective of the right and challenging the black left perspective.

Still more needs to be done, Emmanuel-Jones says, especially a push by all parties to get more people of colour in the party, and in ministerial posts.

He describes his politics as unapologetically 'conservative', and as for a seat in parliament, he really wants it.

"In a sense, one of the things that we have to do as black people is to be that bold and say it belongs to me, I have a right to it rather than waiting to be invited.

I think all too often the problem is when you wait to be invited because if you wait to be invited you're never going to be invited," said Emmanuel-Jones.

Chippenham's issues are clear he says as despite being widely regarded as one of the wealthier parts of the UK it doesn't get enough funding or the attention it deserves.

"It needs pretty high profile, a tough, strong member of parliament who's going to really fight for the constituency's need because it's easier for the inner-cities to get funding, to get attention," says the entrepreneur.

- Reprinted from the Weekly Gleaner, North America