Are Ukip Finished?

[Gromit]

It looks like UKiP peaked too early a couple of months ago. They did well in the local elections, but the are rapidly declining.

// ...the continuing collapse in support for Ukip, down from 18% in May – just after its local election success – to 12% in June and now just 7%.

The fall in the Ukip share may reflect the recent comparative decline in publicity for the party's leader, Nigel Farage, and Downing Street's persistent efforts to neutralise Ukip's appeal by countering with a series of strong messages on immigration, welfare and a referendum on UK membership of the European Union. //

Will UKiP voters transfer to a Conservative Party led by Cameron? Wasn't he the reason most turned to UKiP in the first place? In order to have any chance of winning a majority in 2015, don't the Conservatives need to ditch Dave?

[Peter Pedant]

sudduv finished like the Labout Party ?

too early to say

[FredPuli43]

If the Tories ditch him now, they'll have to have a good reason, such as they had for ditching Mrs Thatcher viz, that her style and fondness for the poll tax had made her suddenly unelectable. They are banking on the Lib Dems being an electoral disaster next time and failing to be the political force they were, and Ed Milliband being seen as an alienating force and unelectable as a leader.

[Gromit]

Fred
// If the Tories ditch him now, they'll have to have a good reason //

Europe.

[mikey4444]

Lets answer the last question first. If May or Boris or pretty well anyone else were to replace Dave, then it would seem to be obvious that there would be a pick-up in the Tory vote. But with less than 24 months to go before we all trudge into the voting booths again, it is now probably too late. A leadership battle would be a very damaging experience for the Tories, as was seen when Major replaced Thatcher, and they won't have enough time to lick their wounds and re-group before May 2015. If they wanted to replace Dave then they should have done not long after the 2010 election, when Tory popularity started its decline, from which it has yet to recover. I don't think that they have any other alternative than to hold on to him, until after the Election at least.

Its hard to be exact where BNP-lites supporters come from but its pretty obvious that the majority come from the ultra right wing of the Tories. Some of those may go back to Dave but not enough. Floating voters like these sometimes don't bother to vote at all !

Has anybody else noted that the face of Farage hasn't been seen so much in the media of late ? Only a few months ago, you could hardly open your newspaper without him grinning back at you, normally with a pint in his hand.

I have never thought that BNP-lite would ever have many seats in Parliament, if any at all, and I see no reason to change my mind now. Perhaps Dave was right after all....A Bunch Of Fruitcakes, Loonies And Closet Racists !

[ichkeria]

If UKIP are finished (early) and Cameron is still at the helm, it follows that the Tories have seen them off without changing their leader and therefore it would be daft for them to ditch him. Especially bearing in mind that a change of leader would probably mean a lurch to the right which doesn't seem a very sensible move given they failed to see off Labour completely the last time with a more moderate agenda. The electorate consists of more than just Tory activists and eurosceptics, much more.
Mind you, this is the Tories ..

[FredPuli43]

Europe is not a reason . All the main parties are broadly pro-Europe, and so is the electorate. But the electorate would like a Thatcherite approach; they think being in, as it is is on unfavourable terms for us. Dave is making the right noises

[Baldric]

///Will UKiP voters transfer to a Conservative Party led by Cameron?///
I don't know about that, but I do know the as long as Posh Boy is in charge
they will not be getting my Vote

[FredPuli43]

Baldric, do you decide not to vote for someone just because they have very rich parents who sent them to Eton? Or is there more to the epithet that you use, "posh boy", than that? Would your favoured candidate be at the other extreme; a boy from a sink estate? If not, where is the borderline from favoured to not favoured lie? Milliband might be closer; Marxist father etc; but he was sent to a posh school too.

[Khandro]

If you want to see the future it's sometimes a good idea to look to the past; with so much disenchantment of present politicians, the emergence of a strong, decisive leadership, should be a strong possibility, but from where?

[mikey4444]

Fred...Ed went to Haverstock Comprehensive School. Quite a good school by all accounts but hardly in the same league as the one that Dave attended
( Er, that's Eton ) surely ?

[bazwillrun]

"If you want to see the future it's sometimes a good idea to look to the past;"

how true

like all empires the eussr is doomed to fail, not if, but when

[FredPuli43]

Yes, mikey, but I'm intrigued by to what extent the son of an academic, in the top stream at a very good, largely middle class, comprehensive, sent on to Oxbridge is a man of the people. My complaint is actually more about candidate selection in general. It seems to me that a large percentage of candidates chosen and who progress are people whose whole career has been politics and the Westminster village, from being researchers onwards. They have been in a bubble. They have never lived a normal life and cannot understand people except in terms of statistics.

[Gromit]

// But with less than 24 months to go before we all trudge into the voting booths again, it is now probably too late. //

Margaret Thatcher was ousted 17 months before the 1992 General Election

[FredPuli43]

(And yes, I thought Milliband had been privately educated !)

[Twenty20]

mikey4444 - he also attended Corpus Christi College, Oxford which, in many people's eyes, would constitute a 'posh school'. It's certainly out of reach for the vast majority of the population.

[Sqad]

Even Michael Foot was educated privately.

[Twenty20]

I would expect UKIP to have a resurgence in the run up to the next general election. Maybe even before then, when the expected influx of Romanians begins in earnest next year.

[jno]

if they've forced Dave to adopt their policies in order to see them off, Ukip might well think their job is successfully done, though of course getting someone else to adopt your policy is the aim of a pressure group rather than a political party.

Still, if they keep hammering away over Europe, which many newspapers will approve of, they may well keep themselves in the news.

[ToraToraTora]

It's natural cycles of politics, mid terms tend to look good for the smaller parties. When we start to edge toward a general election people go back to the broad church. Similar things have happenned to the greens, are they finished? a good wedge of UKIP voters are generally the non wet Tory voters who want to give the leadership a poke. Come GE time they know the score. Labour has similar factions in a mirror image. No mischief to be had here Gromit.

[modeller]

//Will UKiP voters transfer to a Conservative Party led by Cameron?//
Wishful thinking on your part again Gromit ?.

The Tory vote has gone up whilst the Labour has stood still. Both parties are neck and neck.

UKIP has been a catalyst for both Labour and the Tories, they both are scrabbling around trying to appeal to a wider audience. There's Ed trying to distance himself from the unions and not opposing Dave's crack down on welfare reform, and tougher rules on immigration and human rights .