Who Do You Think You Are Kidding, Mr Hitchens?

With his declaration of his intention to contest the next General Election at the head of a national network of Independent candidates forming the embryo of a new traditional-conservative formation, Peter Hitchens has blown out of the water any parliamentary ambitions on the part of UKIP, which he always calls "Dad's Army" in by far the most influential newspaper column among its target voters.

UKIP can have its Strasbourg seats on its single issue basis, possibly even topping the poll next time. But backed by the mighty Mail on Sunday, or at least guaranteed plenty of coverage there, the battle to represent British paleoconservatism at Westminster is now being waged by someone else entirely, as suspicious or dismissive of UKIP as Respect is of the existing factions to the left of Labour, or as the founders of the SDP were of George Brown's Social Democratic Alliance.