At this stage in their development they should be winning by-elections like that. Ask them about the anomaly of hating the EU but having MEPs and they claim it's so they can use the resources to fight in the UK. Well they haven't succeeded there have they? Even Respect, with no MEPs just a loony like Galloway have one MP. Even the Greens, the true lunatic fringe, have one MP.
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| Can UKIP really be taken seriously? |
The main problem for UKIP is that their MEPs have gone native, and key workers in the party are dependent on MEPs for their salaries. The problem there is that most of them are clueless about campaigning and are only there because they are cronies and drinking buddies of their paymasters, the MEPs.
Just as damaging are their policies. They are a totally impossible to achieve wishlist for Daily Mail readers. Spend massive amounts on border security and the military, while slashing taxes. How the hell can that add up?
Let's see what they get in Eastleigh in a general election, not in a by-election when there was a huge protest vote to harvest. And until they have more MPs than Respect or the Greens they should keep shut about claiming to be the third or fourth party, it only makes them sound absurd.
5 comments:
I agree, they should have won a seat by now. As it is, they suck up the protest vote and do nothing useful with it.
RESPECT have their MP because they put all possible resources into one seat and flood the place with Islamist rhetoric whilst demonising the incumbents with sectarian and racist propaganda. Many Muslims will be swayed by that kind of stuff and will vote for the Muslim candidate, or the Muslim of their sect/tribe in Pakistan or Bangladeshi, or will vote for the candidate that is 'their' official candidate (or who the imams tell them to vote for).
The Greens have their seat because they focus entirely on one or two very specific seats, so most of their energy goes into those.
UKIP is trying to build support right across the country, so it's obvious that things are going to be a lot more spread out. To add to that, the FPTP system does NOT help matters. PR would mean that, by now, we'd be in a similar position to the Party for Freedom in the Netherlands, the Danish People's Party in Denmark or the The Finns Party in, er, Finland.
That's the crucial difference. To add to that, UKIP's support is more spread out than is RESPECT's. RESPECT only stand a serious chance of election in a small handful of constituencies in the country and it's usually deprived areas with a very high percentage of voters who are adherents of the religion of peace.
Just to clarify one other point you raise here Gregg - parties with MEPs are only allowed to use the funding from this on European projects.
So if UKIP are claiming to be spending it on domestic campaigning, they are either lying through their teeth or in clear breach of the rules.
Gregg, I think you are being a little harsh. You are an ex member aren't you? If so you did believe in them once obviously.
The only reason that lunatic Galloway is an MP is that he sucked up to the Islamic vote in a largely Muslim constituency. Lucas's fluke election is unlikely to be repeated in Brighton, now that the constituents realise what Green policies are costing the country.
At the 2010 election UKIP got over 900,000 votes. The Greens got less than a third of that and Respect a paltry 30,000.
I think UKIP have every right to claim to be third party now that they are polling higher than the LibDems.
They employ regional organisers etc on their EU funding.
Opinion polls do not count Sean, it's seats in the House of Commons that count. The UKIP manifesto is a total daydream with massive increases in public spending but massive tax cuts. The figures do not add up.
The Greens and Respect are obviously more politically astute than UKIP who have no MPs and fewer councillors, certainly fewer than the Greens.
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