What does Nigel do next? I suspect it’s a question the leader of the People’s Army has been asking himself a fair bit in the days following Ukip’s surrender to the forces of the establishment at Newark.
Of course he may not have been asking himself any questions. Nigel Farage may have bought into the line that Newark was a triumph. Another of those Ukip by-election defeats that presages victory tomorrow.
In which case it really is all over. We can shut the book on Ukip, and its leader.
But for the sake of argument let’s assume Farage woke up on Saturday morning and said to himself: “Hang on, that wasn’t supposed to have happened. I’m meant to leading a popular revolution here and the government of the day just gave me a good hiding in a parliamentary by-election. Something’s not right.” What then?
The first thing Nigel Farage needs to recognise is the party he’s leading isn’t the party he thinks he’s leading. Two years ago Ukip were easily defined. They were, to borrow a phrase from Nick Clegg, “the party of Out”. Labour and the Lib Dems were Europhiles. The Tory party were Euroagnostic. Ukip, in contrast, were the only genuine Eurosceptics.
Yes, they came across as a bit eccentric. A little obsessed, as single-issue parties tend to do. But they were essentially harmless. They had a charismatic leader. And they were tapping into a suspicion about the grand European project that was shared by a significant section of the electorate on both the Left and Right of the political spectrum.
Slowly but surely, however, Ukip has been the subject of a political takeover. The Kippers have given way to Britain’s equivalent of the Tea Party, the Tea Kippers.
The Tea Kippers don’t view Ukip as a single-issue party. Or a political party at all. They see Ukip first as a movement. Then an uprising. And finally a vehicle for unleashing a political civil war on a Britain they despise and no longer understand.
Like the entryism of Trotskyists into Labour in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the rise of the Tea Kippers was the product of many factors. The compromises forced on the Tory and Liberal Democrat parties by coalition. The failure of Labour to establish itself as an effective opposition. The collapse of the BNP. The lingering sense of disillusionment with the political class in the wake of the expense scandal and the 2008 crash.
And like most successful entryists, the Tea Kippers had no recognised leaders as such. But their ideology was neatly expressed by James Delingpole in last week’s Spectator. “What Ukip needs is a moment equivalent to the one in the mid-1970s when, shortly after becoming Tory party leader, Margaret Thatcher slapped down Hayek’s Constitution of Liberty on the table and declared ‘This is what we believe.’ What Ukip needs is an ‘-ism’.”
Well until recently Ukip had an “-ism”. It was called “Euroscepticism”. But in a desperate attempt to “broaden its appeal” and “tap into the public mood” it’s managed to get itself a new “-ism”. Racism.
Several weeks ago I wrote about how Nigel Farage’s attempt to seize the issue of immigration, and exploit it had backfired. The European elections were his opportunity to plant his party firmly in the political mainstream, I said. Instead, he was toxifying the Ukip brand.
And so it proved. In Newark we saw the first ever mobilisation of the anti-Ukip vote. One Tory MP told me, “What I heard on the doorstep was “I voted Ukip in the Euro elections, but I’m not going to help them elect their first MP”. There is a stigma attached to Ukip that wasn’t there at that start of the year.
The Tea Kippers don’t really care. It merely helps them convince themselves of their radical purity. But Nigel Farage should care.
If Ukip’s leader wants to reclaim his party he needs to do three things. The first is that he has to publically and unequivocally acknowledge that his European election campaign was wrong. Not that he was tired, or he had the odd off day. He needs to admit it was a strategic – never mind moral – mistake to push on immigration so aggressively that it tipped over into naked prejudice.
The second thing he needs to do is stop buying into the hype. Ukip are not a revolutionary movement set to shatter the mold of British politics. They have several MEPs, a handful of councilors and no MPs. They are likely to have no MPs after the next election. Farage has to start to manage expectations, in particular amongst the army of Cyber Tea Kippers who in the excitement of the last month have lost their final tenuous grip on reason.
The third thing he has to do is return Ukip to its roots. Ukip is a success when it sticks to what it knows best. And what it knows best is how to construct a case against Brussels.
It was noticeable in the debates with Nick Clegg that Farage was at his most comfortable and most persuasive when forensically dissecting the failures of the EU. It was when he started ranging into immigration, gay marriage, women’s representation in the workplace etc, that he lost his way.
And that’s because it’s not his way. It’s the Tea Kippers’ way.
Nigel Farage will not take the Westminster ramparts. Newark proved that, as did Ukip’s poorer than expected showing in the local and European elections.
But in three years’ time there will be a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU. David Cameron will campaign for Britain to stay in. Nick Clegg will campaign for Britain to stay in. Chuka Umunna, or whoever is Labour leader at the time, will campaign for Britain to stay in.
And the “Out” campaign will be looking for a figurehead. Someone who can articulate the anti-European case in a way that resonates with a public increasingly inclined to stick with the Junker they know.
That referendum represents Nigel Farage’s opportunity. But only if he is leader of Ukip, not leader of the Tea Kippers.
Whoever leads the campaign for Britain to leave the EU has to be able to unite the disparate Eurosceptic tribes. Two years ago Nigel Farage could have brought together both Left and Right in common cause. If the referendum was held tomorrow, they wouldn’t touch him with a bargepole. And the anti-Farage vote alone would hand the Europhiles victory on a plate.
That’s the question Nigel Farage has to address. Is Ukip his party? Or is it the Tea Kippers’ party? He hasn’t got long to come up with an answer.
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Greg Lance - Watkins (Greg_L-W)
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