Ukip Surge Brings Four-Party Politics To Britain.

[Orderlimit]

Labour is struggling to make progress and the Tory vote is falling back and heavier losses for the Lib Dems.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-27531094

[Wharton]

Scotland = SNP or Labour, minority groups such as Conservative or Lib Dems are, well...democratically tolerated.

[Canary42]

Seems the UnKind to Islam Party is here to stay - for now.

[Gromit]

Not sure about 4 party politics. For decades the Liberals have been an irrelevancy and we had a two party system. It was only last election their few votes bought them into a coalition.

And as a result of that, the voters are deserting the LibDems at lightspeed. They are losing lots of votes at local, European, and national level. They must be dreading the general election.

UKiP looked well placed to replace the LibDems as the irrelevant third party in national politics. But their emergence does pose some new questions for politicians and voters.

a) Should the Conservatives try to form an alliance with them in certain seats?
b) Should Labour say now that they will not enter into a coalition with UKiP?
c) At national level, will voters vote UKiP knowing it may create a big Labour majority?
d) Will voters vote UKiP if it means a Conservative led coalition with UKiP?
e) Can UKiP up its game from the shambles of a one man party it is at present?
f) Can UKiP capitalise on what has been an undoubtedly good night for them?
g) Will this force either the Conservatives or Labour to change their policies before the general election?

[Kromovaracun]

UKIP's chances of gaining seats at the general election should (well, hopefully) depend on the actions of their newly-elected councillors. The questions of coalition are rather premature considering they have no seats. Nor are they well-positioned to gain seats - they seem to have a widely spread support base with no geographic concentration.

[Gromit]

// they seem to have a widely spread support base with no geographic concentration. //

They are gaining many councillors which suggests their support is getting concentrated. In Rotherham they won 10 of the 11 seats that were up for election. That would probably equate to a seat in that constituency if they can keep that momentum for another year.

[mikey4444]

Not sure that Labour are struggling to make progress...as at 07:10 this morning, they have gained 94 council seats, against the Tories losing 102.
But it must be said that UKIP have gained 86 seats. Still some time to go before all the results.

No Euro exit Poll last night on the BBC I noticed...not sure why.

[ichkeria]

Maybe you mean "England".
4-party politics already exists in other parts of the UK, although that's assuming one counts the Tories in Scotland

Although I cannot see the answer to Gromit's Question "e" as anything other than a resounding "no". Farage is a bit of a single point of failure for UKIP.

"No Euro exit Poll last night on the BBC I noticed...not sure why. "
Most of the election has not taken place yet, so exit polls may only be allowed on Sunday evening.
Although having said that there was a lot of analysis of the Dutch voting, which seemed to show that Wilders' version of UKIP/Front National had done unexpectedly badly.
So it's not all bad news :-)

[grumpy01]

Interesting comment by Nick Robinson on Breakfast this A.M.."The three main parties will be polishing their excuses."Message to Ed Milliband,Jim Evans obviously not doing that good a job in Swindon,Labour failed to gain any seats here.

[Gromit]

The Rotherham result is interesting (10 of the 11 seats went to UKiP).

It was Rotherham Council who last year removed foster children from a family because they were UKiP supporters.

[Svejk]

you could be right with a) above. ukip and the conservatives should put their heads together to keep labour from winning some seats in the GE.

[Gromit]

// (10 of the 11 seats went to UKiP). //

A mistake there. UKiP won 10 seats out of 21. They gained seats from Conservatives as well as Labour and are now the official opposition party. They also took votes from the BNP. A defector from the Conservatives was re-elected as a UKiP councillor.
The Labour Deputy leader lost his seat. He had been suspended for several months accused of protecting his cousin who was one of the guilty in the Rotherham Child sex case.

[anotheoldgit]

I forecast weeks ago that if the Tories joined with UKIP they would win the next election.

I don't know if this could happen under the weak Cameron, especially after the insults he has made against UKIP but with the help from some 'real' Tory back benches it could come to pass.

Lets hope so for the future good of this country.

[youngmafbog]

Mickey, labour have managed to gain overall, but they also lost some to UKIP.

Labour should be doing much better. the coalition is a shambles and Milliband has failed to capitalise on this, which is a shame as a strong opposition makes for a good Government.

[Khandro]

The swing to UKIP is a triumph of common sense and a demonstration that;
'You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.'
Abraham Lincoln ;-)

[emmie]

Labour has the biggest problem in Milliband, perhaps if they had someone else in control of the party, they may have been doing considerably better by now.

[mikey4444]

ymb...you are partly right...Labour should have done better, and they may still do better, as there are lots of local council seats still to be declared.

But as it stands at 09:00 ::

Lab...... +102
Con...... -94
LD....... -99
UKIP.... +86

So, the ruling coalition parties have lost about 200 seats and Labour and UKIP have gained about 200 seats. Too early to make firm conclusions, but it does appear to be a disaster for dave and cleggie.

[DrFilth]

youngmafbog last night 1 lib voter and 4 labour voters all voted ukip

no faith in ed and i also have no faith in him

[ChillDoubt]

Too early to make firm conclusions, but it does appear to be a disaster for dave and cleggie.
--------------------
...with a major disappointment for Miliband.
And what's your assessment of the 'minor political party', how did they fare?

[mikey4444]

Can I add to my previous post ....Labour seem to be in control of 28 Councils and the Tories in control of only 17. UKIP have yet to win enough seats to control a single Council. An earthquake ? ...perhaps a small tremor !

[mikey4444]

Chili...the minor party still has only 90 Council seats, control zero Councils, and still have no MPs....hardly the performance of a major party is it ?