Ukip is hammering the political elite in Westminster
A MOOD of rebellion is sweeping the country, fuelled by anger at the treachery and incompetence of our rulers. The three main parties are now paying the price for treating the British public with contempt for far too long.
The widespread fury at the Westminster establishment has been crystalised by a couple of recent factors. One was the murder by two Muslim fanatics of Drummer Lee Rigby in Woolwich, an atrocity that exposed the devastating failure of the state’s official dogma of multiculturalism.
Another is the growing recognition that, due to the EU’s systematic demolition of our borders, no fewer than 29 million Bulgarians and Romanians will be able to settle here next year, with rights to claim housing, benefits, education and healthcare.
The public knows that Britain is facing an identity crisis. Our very integrity as an independent nation is under threat from European integration and mass immigration. In the face of this discontent, the politicians have reacted with a predictable mix of bullying and propaganda.
Prattling about the joys of diversity, politicians claim that millions of jobs are at risk if Britain does not remain under EU subjugation. But this bluster and blackmail is no longer effective. For voters now have a real alternative to the fashionable, destructive orthodoxy of the three main parties. The phenomenal rise in support for Ukip shows the strength of the public’s disillusion with a failing establishment. The latest poll, published at the weekend, shows Ukip on 21 per cent, far ahead of the Liberal Democrats on just six per cent, and just five points behind the Tories.
This follows remarkable results in last month’s county council elections, when Ukip won almost a quarter of the vote. Another recent survey showed that Ukip could top the poll in next year’s European parliamentary elections, driving the Tories into third place. And Nigel Farage, Ukip’s leader, is more popular than David Cameron or Ed Miliband.
Ukip’s surge is a disaster for the Conservatives. Cameron once described Farage’s party as a gang of “fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists” but his offensive insult has backfired, with Ukip now almost on level terms with the Tories. In its sneering condescension, Cameron’s language encapsulated the arrogance of the progressive metropolitan elite. But it is precisely that patronising attitude which has done so much damage not only to the fabric of our country but also to the standing of the Tory party.
Indeed, the rise of Ukip is an indictment of Cameron’s entire modernisation strategy. He claimed he was reaching out to the centre ground through policies like green taxes, gay marriage and more foreign aid. But in truth, he only succeeded in alienating mainstream voters who want tough action on immigration and the EU. There is now an air of desperation about the Conservatives, as defections to Ukip mount and major donors withdraw.
Flailing around, Cameron and fellow senior Tories now try to sound tough with rhetoric about cracking down on benefit tourism and giving us a referendum on the EU. But their credibility is shot. The public no longer believes what they say. Ministers boast about cutting net immigration, for instance, but the reality is that more than 500,000 foreigners are still arriving here each year.
In the same vein, few people trust Cameron to stick to his pledge to hold a referendum on membership of the EU. Tory strategists try to comfort themselves with the thought that Ukip voters will flock back at the general election in 2015, when faced with the possibility of Ed Miliband becoming prime minister. But that is wishful thinking. The Ukip vote is more solid than the Conservatives admit.
The party's rise is an indictment of Cameron
Where I live, on the Isle of the Thanet in Kent, the Tories are in meltdown, having been the dominant party for decades. At the recent county elections, Ukip won every seat except one, while in a district council by-election last week, caused by the jailing of the former Tory leader for fraud, Ukip won easily with 41 per cent of the vote, the Conservatives slumping to just 17 per cent.
If Nigel Farage stood in either of the two Thanet seats, both currently held by Tory MPs, I have little doubt he would be elected in a landslide.
Indeed, there is a real possibility that the Conservatives could be obliterated at the next general election. That might sound far fetched, but it is exactly what happened in Canada in 1993. There the ruling but unpopular Progressive Conservative Party held 156 seats going into the campaign. But they came under severe pressure from the Reform Party, a populist, anti-Government, anti-immigration movement very similar to Ukip. Incredibly, the Conservatives lost all but two of their seats and were never a force again in Canadian politics.
Yet Labour shouldn’t be complacent about Ukip’s growth. It was telling that in the county council elections Ukip performed most strongly in traditional Labour areas. It’s hardly a surprise, given that it’s the working class, once backbone of the Labour movement, that has suffered most from mass immigration, the elite being insulated by their wealth.
These abandoned voters are hardly going to be won back by Miliband, who clings to the elitist progressive agenda. Whatever the outcome in 2015, Ukip has already transformed politics. The old parties can no longer suppress debates about immigration and the EU. The people of Britain are, at last, finding their voice.
http://www.express.co.uk/comment/column ... estminster
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