Ukip should be ready for the grind
It is time for fewer TV images of Nigel down the pub and a lot more questions about what he would do with power
In politics, as sometimes in life, there can be nothing more disappointing than a dream that comes true. It was the decades- long yearning of Lib Dems that Britain’s traditional two- horse race would give way to a pluralistic, multi- party politics. The grip on power of the big two would be broken and supplanted by a rainbow of choices. Now that Lib Dem wish appears to be close to fulfilment. The old blue- red duopoly is fragmenting under the multiple and interwoven pressures of austerity, insecurity, anger with traditional politics and questions of identity. The combined polling share of Labour and the Tories has rarely been so low. The Nationalists are on a roll in Scotland. The Greens are enjoying a surge. Ukip has just bagged its second by- election victory. Multi- party politics has arrived with a bang. And who is that lying on the floor? Why, it is the Lib Dems.
Britain has got the multi- party politics the Lib Dems dreamt of, but it has come in a form that is nightmarish for them. The past masters of the sensational by- election upset have just suffered the worst ever byelection result for a major party. If “major party” is still an appropriate description for the Lib Dems when they now languish in fifth place in some national polls. They achieved less than 1 per cent of the vote in Rochester and Strood and suffered their 11th lost deposit of this parliament. As Stephen Tall, the co- editor of Liberal Democrat Voice, wittily puts it : “At £ 500 ( Dh2,876) a pop, it’s one other way the Lib Dems are helping to slow down the spiralling national debt.”
They were relieved that they just squeaked ahead of a dominatrix who was standing as an independent and competing with them for the masochist vote. The number of crosses in the Lib Dem box came to a grand total of just 349. Nick Clegg could spend this weekend penning a hand- written note of thanks to each of his voters in Rochester and Strood and he would still have plenty of time to play with his children.
This does not mean that there is now no purpose for the Lib Dems. One of their continuing roles is to offer comfort to Labour and the Tories that, however badly they are both struggling, someone else is doing even worse. Whatever they say about winning the seat back at the general election, it was a bad night for the Conservatives. Back in October, Tories spoke about this contest with relish. At the Conservative confer-
Though Ukip complains that it is wrong to see them as just a protest party, it has actually been a great advantage to them in this age of rage.
ence in Birmingham, I heard very senior figures at the heart of Conservative campaign strategy express bullish confidence that they would beat Ukip ( UK Independence Party) in Kent and by doing so burst the purple balloon.
When Mark Reckless revealed that he was jumping into bed with the Farageistes, Prime Minister David Cameron declared, in one of his descents into the demotic, that he would “kick his fat a***” out of Westminster. He also promised to “throw the kitchen sink” at the contest and duly did, hurling himself at the fray five times — an unusual amount of campaigning by a prime minister for a by- election. Yet, they still lost a contest they had constantly said they could win and they are reduced to finding solace in being defeated by a narrower margin than the final polls indicated.
What ought to have been the most agonising night for the Tories turned out to be an even more excruciating one for Labour. The reason why is very instructive about the panic spreading through the party that Ukip is turning into as big a menace to Labour as it is to the Tories.
Smug metropolitan snootiness
Was Emily Thornberry foolish to tweet a picture of a house in Strood draped with St George’s flags and a white van parked outside? Obviously, it didn’t show the judgement that you may hope to find in someone with ambitions to be attorney general. She dug a deeper pit for herself with her initial explanation that she had found the sight “remarkable”. But most revealing of all about the state of the Labour party was the manner in which it reacted. Some of her colleagues swiftly joined, and thus validated, the attacks on her by agreeing with critics from the right that the tweet was an expression of smug metropolitan snootiness towards the working class. She was then sacked by Ed Miliband in an act of late- night panic.
Nigel Farage has long complained that the media- political complex has not given him and his party the attention it deserves. Well, he cannot say that now. He revels in wall- to- wall media coverage. He has both Tory and Labour MPs deeply spooked. He has their strategists desperately working to try to find a vaccine for Faragebola and so far failing. Some of the most distinguished of our psephologists declare that the Ukip effect is so disruptive that they have no idea what will happen at the general election.
Though Ukip complains that it is wrong to see them as just a protest party, it has actually been a great advantage to them in this age of rage. Sometimes what sounds like populist leftism comes out of the mouth of a leader who once declared himself to be the greatest fan of Margaret Thatcher.
The general of this self- styled “people’s army” is a former broker in the City. His turbo- Thatcherite, multimillionaire backers include Stuart Wheeler, a man who made his fortune from spread betting and lives in a Jacobean castle. Yet, the claim that Ukip is the champion of the ordinary man is rarely challenged and constantly indulged by those endless TV images of Nigel supping at pints.
No one from the other parties laughs when Farage conjectures that he could have 20 MPs in the next parliament and hold the balance of power. He will not be prime minister, but there are scenarios in which he could get to choose who is prime minister. With that potential power ought to come the responsibility to explain in detail what he might do with it.
The traditional parties and much of the media are still struggling with how to treat Ukip. Here is an idea. Subject them to the robust interrogation of policies and postures that is applied to every other party that aspires to decide how Britain is governed. Fewer pictures of Nigel down the pub, more questions about what he would do with power. Ukip wants to be taken seriously. So it should be. But as the Lib Dems have painfully discovered, ultimately there may be nothing more disappointing for Ukip than having its dream come true.