Kipper Smoked Out

So there we have it.

 

Nigel Farage's concession that UKIP will never win a seat in the House of Commons, and that he himself thinks little or nothing of that House, since he would not wish his standing for it to "distract" him from his standing for the European Parliament.

 

Of course UKIP's support would always have been back down to 15 per cent next year. When it comes to General Elections, people do not vote for pub bore anti-politicians, not even for pub bore anti-politicians who have been salaried politicians for donkey's years and who have already sought election to the Commons no fewer than six times.

 

Perhaps UKIP was worried that, if it ever did win a seat, then it would receive only the attention paid to the Green Party? Or that if Farage himself ever got in, then he would be treated in only the same way as almost all of his 649 new colleagues?

 

That threat to UKIP or to Farage has never existed, but the problem is real.

 

What is not real, however, is the transfer to UKIP of "core Labour voters". So UKIP came second at Rotherham or at South Shields? Someone always did, and someone always will. We all know who, in fact. It is from there that any increase in the UKIP vote in the North will come next month.

 

In two of the three Northern regions, the Conservatives topped the poll last time, as they also did in Wales, although Labour did so in all of those places the time before that.

 

When, a mere three weeks from now, Labour tops the poll in Wales and in all three Northern regions, then will that be because its base of support had collapsed? If it had even come second (its position in three of those four regions last time) behind UKIP, with the Conservatives in third place, then would that have been the explanation?

 

The Conservatives' current Leader in the European Parliament sits for the one Northern region where Labour remained on top in 2009. Yes, you read aright: the Leader of the Conservative MEPs sits for the North East. He used to be on Gateshead Council. Gateshead, where Farage recently told his audience that he was a Thatcherite.

 

Anyone who reported the politics of India with the illiteracy that is routine to the point of universality in relation to the politics of the North of England would be sacked on the spot, or never employed in the first place.